


when we have any power

by sunbrights



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Afterlife, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers to Soulmates, Implied/Referenced Substance Abuse, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Mutual Pining, Past Character Death, Pre-Canon, Rivals to Friends to Soulmates, everybody's dead but i promise on balance this is a happy story
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-24
Updated: 2021-01-05
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:20:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 60,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22869250
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunbrights/pseuds/sunbrights
Summary: Soulmates aren't found. They're made.(The Good Place fusion.)
Relationships: Margo Hanson & Eliot Waugh, Quentin Coldwater & Margo Hanson & Eliot Waugh, Quentin Coldwater/Eliot Waugh
Comments: 105
Kudos: 167





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi there! Couple of things before we get started:
> 
> 1) Please be mindful of the tags! This is very much a happy (and also often very silly) story, but it's still a story about death and dying, and it does dig into some heavy discussions of substance abuse and mental illness/depression/suicide. Take care of yourselves, friends.
> 
> 2) This story has no spoilers for The Good Place, and (hopefully) doesn't require much pre-knowledge of it in order to be understood and enjoyed. (I have Thoughts about how it fits into the larger Good Place canon, but they're not really relevant or important to the story, tbh.) This is mostly just me taking advantage of a flexible setting and running with it.
> 
> And that's it! Thanks for reading!

His soulmate is a twenty-two year old Norwegian man named Arne.

The peppy brunette who seems to be the designated Fount of All Knowledge gives him a photo and a single-page bullet-list summary, tucked inside a canary yellow file folder. Arne is studying to become a teacher. He has a black cat named Sassa, likes to play board games in his spare time, and hopes to be a father one day. He has a round, open face and soft blue eyes. He’s wearing skinny jeans, a fitted sweater in olive green, and square, rimless glasses.

Eliot would fuck him, sure. And maybe that’s a trashy first thought to be having about the ultimate perfect match for your eternal soul, but supposedly Arne would be into that sort of thing. So.

“Do I get to meet him?” Eliot asks.

“Oh, he’s not dead yet,” All-Knowing Brunette says, which— yeah. Maybe he should’ve expected that someone like Arne wouldn’t be dead before twenty-five, the way someone like Eliot would be. Is. “But don’t worry, he’ll only live a few more decades or so. Five, on average.” 

She says _decades_ the way a human person might say _minutes,_ but he guesses that makes sense for an abstract construct of the universe existing outside the boundaries of linear time. She has a big, blinding smile, and wears a lot of purple.

“Right,” he answers, and tucks the folder under his arm. “Thanks.”

  


* * *

  


Being dead is weird, because it’s basically the same as being alive. He still has a body, for one, with all the requisite moving parts. He suspects that some of the 'burden of living' shit might be optional (he experiments with not breathing for a while, and makes it at least ten or fifteen minutes before he forgets and starts back up again), but other than that it's sort of— weirdly, uncannily, uncomfortably similar.

The afterlife itself is set up like a little city neighborhood, or some quaint historic downtown: more compact than suburbia but more spacious than Manhattan. He gets the whole leisurely walking tour from an older gentleman in a heather gray suit and peacock bowtie; there are restaurants with outdoor patios, and coffee shops, and clothing stores, and more frozen yogurt places than any real municipality’s economy could ever reasonably support.

“Capitalism in the afterlife,” he comments, when a smiley employee in a mint green visor hands him a cup of froyo that tastes how a well-fitted blazer feels. “That’s certainly a choice.”

His tour guide flaps a hand at him like it doesn’t matter. “It’s more like window dressing,” he explains. “To make you all feel more comfortable here. I’m not sure I even really _get_ ‘money,’ to be perfectly honest with you. How’d you like to see where you’ll be staying?”

And that’s… it.

No one flashes a rap sheet at him. There’s no renouncement of earthly pleasures, or solemn contemplation of his vices. If there’s _supposed_ to be— like, if this is some sort of final trial to evaluate the resiliency of his morals or the purity of his spirit or whatever— then it’s a long fucking con, and he’s failing miserably. 

Break for audience surprise.

No?

(As it happens, he gets a couple gorgeous bottles of Romanée-Conti in the welcome basket they give him, which is entire flights of stairs above what he expected from his untimely death. So if this is some bait-and-switch pitstop before the uncaring void, so be it.)

‘Where he’s staying’ turns out to be a picturesque little cottage around the corner: two stories, white bevel siding, with a scalloped tile roof and wrap-around veranda. Very cute. Very wholesome. Just the sort of thing he'd expect from Maybe-Heaven masquerading as something earthly.

"Every residence here is perfectly calibrated to its resident," Charlie Angel tells him. (Is he an angel? Eliot's still not clear on that.) He gets a smidge dancy on the way up the path, obviously proud of himself. "A flawless reflection of your true essence."

Which—

Sure.

The cottage is tucked down on a shaded side street, not too far removed from the action of the rest of the neighborhood, but swaddled in enough trees to create a mysterious bubble of privacy. There’s no house number, just a brass plaque by the door with WAUGH embossed on it in plain, capital letters, like his own perfect domestic nightmare.

“This is all me?” he asks, when Boss Man hands him the keys.

“All you,” he confirms. “I’ll let you get settled in. If you need anything at all, or have any questions, Janet’s always here to help.”

The Brunette of Knowing— who is now suddenly just _there,_ somehow, in the empty space next to his elbow— gives him a thumbs up.

He still has Arne’s file folder, stuffed between his ribs and his bicep. He doesn’t have anything else to move in, because obviously he doesn’t.

“Okay,” he says. “Thanks. I guess.”

The brunette— Janet— smiles brilliantly at him, right before she blinks back out of existence. Maybe-Angel-Maybe-Not lingers a few seconds longer on the doorstep, and then leans over to push the door of Eliot’s new eternal resting place open for him. _He_ didn’t need keys, apparently.

"Take a look around," he says, more gently. It makes something twinge at the base of Eliot’s spine.

He's loathe to use the word _cozy_ ever, even at his most desperate, but it... is. It’s a warm and inviting space, with rich cherry floors, patterned wallpaper in shades of dark green, and deep-cushioned chairs around a fireplace. Even just from the tiny foyer, he can tell that the kitchen is spacious and pristine, and can spy a seat in the bay window, spilled over with sunshine.

He’s not sure he sees where his alleged ‘true essence’ comes in, but whatever. It’s fine. He doesn’t hate it.

“It’s a big change,” the tour guide says behind him, like it’s Eliot’s first day of kindergarten. He’s still on the other side of the threshold, outside on the welcome mat. “All our new residents go through an— adjustment period. It’s normal to feel apprehensive.”

“Can't see why,” Eliot answers. He runs his palm over the leather back of an arm chair; it's some impossible combination of smooth, comfortable, and flawless. "Not like there's much to complain about."

Tour Guide doesn’t have anything to say to that. He stands there, watching him, giving off his disappointed-dad vibes.

“Well,” he says finally, on a sigh, “take some time to enjoy it.” He raps his knuckles against the inside of the doorframe. "I’ll check in with you later.”

  


* * *

  


Eliot makes it twenty minutes before he cracks open the wine. 

He has to hand it to The Powers That Whatever: they got his kitchen _just_ right. He finds a corkscrew and an elegant fleur-de-lis wine stopper in the first place he looks: behind the wet bar, in the second-to-last drawer on the right. He turns, and the glasses are behind him, hung on a polished mahogany rack and meticulously organized by size, shape, and style.

Everything is effortless like that. It’s a gas stove, with a suite of copper cookware suspended over it like a glittering, functional chandelier. There’s a cast iron skillet stored down in the oven, and a stand mixer next to jars of dry ingredients. The island has butcher’s block countertops and a mercifully uncluttered knife strip: essentials only, save for a perfect replica of the santoku he scrimped and saved to buy back home, down to the scuffs on the wooden handle. 

He pours himself a glass and thinks about lunch, because why not?

The fridge is massive (upper-class-suburban-SAHM-grade at _minimum_ ), and stocked like a mini-grocery store: newly washed fruits and vegetables, fresh-cut herbs, milk and cream of all varieties, a drawer reserved just for cheese, and shelves on shelves of meat. Chicken, beef, pork, lamb, what looks like four different kinds of fish; everything broken down and ready to cook.

It’s a lot. Literally, mostly, but also not _not_ psychologically.

He sets his chin on the edge of his shoulder and says into the empty room: “Janet?”

She blips into existence on the other side of the island. He can practically hear a helpful little _ding_ in the back of his head.

“Hi there!” she says, hands folded demurely in front of her. “How can I help you?”

He steps aside to show her the entirety of the double-barrel refrigerator. “Not that I don’t appreciate the thought,” he says, “but there’s no way I can eat all of this before it spoils.”

“It won’t spoil,” she says, without a hint of hesitation or flicker in her smile. Not like she’s confident about it, like it’s just _true,_ like it’s a fact she read in a book. Like it’s a fact she’s _currently reading_ from a book. A book that is, apparently, just her brain. Or whatever passes for the brain of an embodiment of knowledge itself.

He shuts the fridge doors. Leans back against them so that one smooth, stainless steel handle fits between his shoulderblades. “So, I have a question.”

“I love questions,” she says, and he— fucking christ— actually believes her. “What would you like to know?”

“What’s your deal?” She opens her mouth, and he already knows: too broad. They’ll be here for years, probably. Or whatever passes for years, now. “Anthropomorphized vault of all knowledge in the universe, known and unknown, I get that part.” She nods enthusiastically. Glad to be on the same page. “But, like, what are my ground rules here? Any no-nos? Dark arts? Forbidden fruit? That kind of thing.”

“Nope!” She hasn’t even moved. She just stands there, smiling at him. It should be creepy as shit, and somehow it isn’t. “You can ask me anything you like, for or about anything in the universe.”

“For,” he repeats. 

“Yes.”

“I could ask you for _literally_ anything.”

“Yes.”

“So if I asked you for—” He racks his brain. Except: literally anything, so maybe he shouldn’t. “I don’t know. A grape that’s made out of solid gold, but is also still edible, tastes like champagne, and has just, like, a little hit of molly. The good kind.”

She holds her hand out to him, over the island. It takes him a second to realize that she’s _offering,_ that she’s got a little gold grape right in the palm of her hand, just like that.

“Oh,” he says.

She’s probably the most wholesome stranger he’s ever taken drugs from. He considers the possibility that maybe, just maybe, this is a low-bar test he’s supposed to be passing, but— whatever. There’s not enough extra credit in the universe to keep his ass out of the pit, probably. Might as well roll for a bit while he has the opportunity.

He pops the grape in his mouth.

It’s perfect. Pointlessly luxurious, oddly-but-satisfyingly bubbly, and just the barest blast of substance-induced brightness. 

He points at her, full on, and she smiles even bigger. “Oh, Janet,” he says. “You and I are going to make a _marvelous_ team.”

  


* * *

  


Anyway, what’s the point of being dead if nobody gets absolutely fucking demolished about it?

Because obviously he’s thought about what his own death day celebration would look like. It's both deliciously macabre and conveniently abstract, the perfect thing to contemplate at four in the morning while you’re still strung out on mediocre sex and a cocaine crash. Ergo, what better way to ring in his afterlife? _Carpe mortem,_ right?

He’d pictured candlelight. Candle _wax._ Easy-access champagne, and delicate chocolate-dipped ladyfingers. A candy bowl fit to serve all nights and all stripes. Sprawling beds with silk sheets in dark turquoise. 

Or— garnet, maybe.

Citrine?

“No,” he mutters. “That’s not it, either.”

Being actually, literally dead _should_ be the perfect opportunity for it. On paper, anyway. He’s not restricted by time, space, cost, or logistics. It’s on-theme. There’s the added benefit of being able to attend himself, but that’s— why it doesn’t work, maybe. A party _for_ him has a very different schema than one _about_ him.

Hindsight, twenty.

“Reset,” he tells Janet, for the fifth or sixth time, and she does, for the fifth or sixth time. The whole bottom floor of the cottage flips back to vanilla: rich-dark color palette, dim lighting, and all. 

It’s not _terrible._ Simple, maybe, but that’s not always a bad thing. There are other ways to spice things up. It’s aesthetically unobtrusive, which is more than he can say for the vanilla state of Mason’s ‘communal living area.’

“Ugh, fine,” he sighs, and Janet smiles at him even though he’s not talking to her. “I guess I’ll _start small._ ”

“Okay!” she says, totally unbothered that he’s just wasted a good forty-five minutes of her time, which tracks. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”

“Next we think body count.” He tops off his glass, and has to remember not to offer to Janet again, now that she’s turned him down twice already. “How many people are there?” he asks. “In this neighborhood?”

“Three hundred and eighty one,” she answers, “not including you. Would you like me to distribute an invitation?”

An _invitation._ He can picture it, hazy and holographic and with bubble lettering, and manages to choke down his mouthful of wine, but only just. “Jesus. No.” _No._ He’s dead, not a new mom trying to break into the PTA scene. “Just— I need to know who the most influential ones are. Socially. Can you tell me that?”

She doesn’t even entertain the idea of missing a beat. “Would you like a full ranking?”

Absolutely not. God, could you imagine?

(But he does file the concept of _full rankings_ away for later, because, whatever. He never claimed to be a fucking saint, and no one in the afterlife seems interested in double-checking.)

“Give me number four,” he decides. “Whoever that is.”

Four is a solid number to target. Someone who just keeps missing the top three is guaranteed to be more motivated than somebody who’s already comfortably in it. They’ll take more risks, and take more people along with them when they do, with the right nudges in the right directions.

Janet nods. She doesn’t think about it. “Sascha Bykov."

"Perfect." He raises his glass, and Janet, ever the team player, raises her empty hand in return. "Tell me everything."

  


* * *

  


This is the easy part.

Sascha Bykov lives in an apartment building overlooking the neighborhood’s tiny-but-bustling downtown, maybe a ten minute jaunt away. He goes for a walk at 10:30 every morning, at which point, according to Janet, it’s easy to casually bump into him. Because he’s famously friendly, of course, but also because he is, from what Eliot can tell, an absolute _sequoia_ of a man: six-five and built like a train car. 

(Incidentally, Eliot is looking forward to meeting him.)

It’s a cute building. Four stories, orange brick, with a little fenced-in courtyard out front. He posts up by the gate with a cigarette, and only has to wait a few minutes before the glass front doors slam open. 

It's not Sascha Bykov who stumbles out, though. It is, presumably, a neighbor: a guy in a dark green flannel and beat-up converse, with maybe half a dozen loose books in his arms and, confusingly, an empty messenger bag slung over his shoulder. 

Logically it follows that other people would live in the building. Eliot had assumed the apartments came part-and-parcel with some Heavenly Interventionist soundproofing, mostly because he hadn’t been able to imagine someone with an essence tragic enough to be perfectly calibrated for life on a middle floor— but, well. Maybe now he can.

There’s a frenetic, rumpled sort of charm to the guy, though. He has a pen stuck behind one ear, and most of his hair corralled into a small, messy bun. He’s trying to walk and pack his bag at the same time, a strategy which has historically worked for no one, and when he adds ‘open the front gate’ to that already-precarious list, the pocket notebook clutched in his left hand flips out of his fingers and hits the ground at Eliot’s feet.

Eliot hears him swear, “Dangit,” under his breath, and just— _seriously._ It should be illegal to be this easy. For Eliot, specifically, to be this easy.

It's a pretentious, leather bound little thing. Eliot keeps his legs long when he bends to pick it up, tucks it into one of the (many) open front pockets of the guy's messenger bag, and says, “Hi.”

The guy looks at him like Eliot just caught him red-handed, being vaguely disorganized in public. He freezes, books sliding against his chest, and answers, “Hi?”

“I’m Eliot,” Eliot tries again. "You're welcome."

The guy wilts a bit, an oblique dig at his manners apparently enough to cut him to the quick. "Right," he says. "Right, uh— thanks. Sorry, I'm, like, super frazzled right now."

Eliot raises his eyebrows at the bag, which now has a grand total of one book in it. "I noticed."

The guy opens his mouth and closes it again. He smiles tightly, and then doesn’t say anything else, focusing instead on the monumental task of organizing his belongings, slightly more achievable now that he's standing still. 

And they could just leave it there, an awkward end to a largely-awkward interaction, but, well. He’s cute, Eliot’s bored, and he’s still got some time left to kill.

“Looks like we’re neighbors,” he says, and the guy’s eyes slide shut like he desperately cannot believe Eliot’s chosen to prolong this. 

Too bad.

Eliot flicks his cigarette in the direction he came from, which amounts to pointing at a hedge flanking the courtyard. Whatever, the whole place is called a ‘neighborhood,’ so close enough. “I just moved in down the street,” he goes on. He takes a drag, considering. “Which I guess is the fun and friendly way of saying I’m recently deceased.”

“Oh,” the guy answers, blinking rapidly. “Uh. I’m— sorry?”

He sounds more confused than sincerely sorry. Eliot waves him off anyway. “Common affliction around here, from what I understand. Anyway—” 

Then the front door of the building squeaks open again, and Sascha Bykov finally ducks out, in all his handsome, hulking glory. 

Perfect timing.

“I’m having a party tonight,” Eliot finishes smoothly, and does his level best not to preen when he feels Sascha’s eyes snap over to them. Well. Not preen _overmuch._ “Friendly housewarming. You should come.”

“Oh,” the guy says again. “Um.”

He's trying to say no, only he doesn't know how to do it without being rude to a stranger, because he's worried about being rude to a stranger. Eliot knows his type: high-strung, socially awkward, cute in an under-the-radar-but-not-actually, _She's All That_ sort of way. It's good. Gives him a head start.

"Don't worry," he says, to buy himself a few extra seconds. "I've got food, booze, the works. No better way to get to know the neighbors than good old-fashioned culinary bribery, am I right?"

The guy opens his mouth again, except it's too late to get his ‘no’ out now, because Sascha Bykov has caught up with them. 

The rumors were true. Or, at least, the photos and information Janet gave him were accurate. Eliot’s not used to having to look up— not in the harsh light of day, anyway, or at least not usually— but Sascha is tall enough to get even him to lift his chin. He’s as broad as he is tall, almost, and muscly in a strongman way more than a bodybuilder way, which has the dissonant effect of making him seem… cuddly. Like one of those giant teddy bears that are basically their own lounge chairs.

“Morning,” Sascha says. It’s directed at their now sort-of-mutual acquaintance, but he smiles at both of them, apparently eager to spread the good morning cheer around. Like, _really_ smiles: an open, friendly, guileless one, not the perfunctory one that comes out of accidental proximity. 

(It probably says something about human nature that a person like that hasn’t quite been able to crack top three on the ‘social influence’ scoreboard, even in Not-Heaven. But, you know, all's fair, and all that.)

“Uh, hey," the guy answers, his own smile small and polite and artificial. 

Sascha keeps smiling. Eliot keeps smoking. Some indeterminate but truly excruciating amount of time later, the guy realizes that he’s been forced into the role of social bridge, and full devastation blooms plain on his face.

He tries to point with the hand still wrapped around the strap of his bag; it ends up a jerky, awkward gesture that snaps right back to his chest. “Sascha, um, this is—” There’s panic in his eyes. He doesn’t remember Eliot’s name. “This is, uh—”

“Eliot,” Eliot supplies, and the guy’s shoulders visibly slump. Good god, the anxiety just _radiates_ off of him, doesn’t it? “I was just inviting your friend here to my housewarming.” 

He counts beats in his head. One, two, three— 

“ _Ah,_ ” he finishes, with a generous and apologetic tip of his hand, “and you’re welcome to stop by, too, of course. The more the merrier.”

The friendly smile unfolds into a broad, knowing grin. “A new neighbor!” Sascha reaches out to crush one of Eliot’s hands in both of his. “Welcome! Welcome. Tonight, you said?”

“All night,” Eliot agrees.

Sascha laughs: a big, booming, baritone thing. “Good answer,” he says, head bobbing. He leans in toward his neighbor, all faux-conspiracy and bright eyes, and adds, “I like him. Where did you find him?”

The guy’s eyebrows quirk, his smile a little too flat, like he’s trying to rein it in. His eyes dart back up to Eliot’s, long-suffering but amused. “Uh,” he answers, with a new, unexpected tilt of wryness, “literally right here, actually. Like, ten seconds ago.”

It has the effect of making Sascha laugh again; he gives the kid a friendly smack on the back that nearly takes him off his feet. “A lucky morning for both of us, then,” he says, with no irony whatsoever. “I’m on my way out, but it’s good to meet you—?”

“Eliot,” Eliot says again. He steps back to clear the path. “Hopefully we’ll get to chat again soon.”

Sascha claps him on the shoulder as he passes, grinning. “Maybe we will! Maybe we will.” Once, twice, three times, with increasing jolly intensity. “Welcome to the neighborhood,” he points Eliot square in the chest, “Eliot.”

Then he edges through the gate and lumbers off down the street, and every single nerve ending in Eliot’s skin lights up with victory.

Like he thought: easy. But _oh,_ so satisfying, too.

He’s just about finished with his cigarette. Sascha’s cute, nervous, nerdy neighbor has finished tucking his books into his bag, finally, where they belong. The silence between them is spiraling back towards awkward again without Sascha’s bombastic, billowing intensity to fill the space.

Eliot's gotten this far. Why not push his luck?

“Um, so,” the guy says, already edging his way into the classic shoulder-hunch side-shuffle of someone trying to escape a conversation. “It was nice meeting you.”

“Likewise,” Eliot says. He stubs what’s left of his cigarette out on the nearest wrought-iron point of the fence. “Anyway, nine-ish.”

The guy frowns at him, his brows folding together. It makes him look like a very grumpy puppy. “I don’t—”

“The party.” Eliot sets a new cigarette between his lips. Lights it. “If you want to come.”

He takes a drag. Longer than he needs to, slower than he needs to— mm, _deeper_ than he needs to. He basks for a second in the familiar pain-pleasure of smoke in his lungs, lets the zip of nicotine through his blood flutter his eyelashes.

The guy is still watching him, when he focuses back up again.

Eliot feels himself smile, sharp-edged. He blows the stream of smoke away with a quick purse of his lips. 

“You should,” he finishes. “Come, I mean.”

On his way home, he makes a mental note to ask Janet if he can put the memory of his neighbor’s deliciously pink cheeks in a frame.

  


* * *

  


It all comes together.

Naturally.

Sure, he maybe ends up with a cross-section of demographics that he’s not strictly accustomed to— Srat Squads and Frat Stars, dark-haired wine moms and unkempt whiskey uncles, septuagenarians who drink vodka like water and dazed thirtysomethings who’ve forgotten what their limits are. And yes, it is _possible_ that he underestimated the impact being actually, literally dead would have as an x-factor on all those people's desire to party the fucking roof down, even a stranger's.

But never let it be said that Eliot Waugh turned a challenge away at the door.

He tweaks the playlist to something poppy and people-pleasing, and turns the volume up. He plays bartender for longer than he might otherwise, and adds just a pinch more showboating; Janet’s on-the-spot, perfectly calibrated drinks are all well and good, but Eliot knows there’s a mystique to a man with rolled-up sleeves and a cocktail shaker that simply can’t be beat.

It earns him a crowded dance floor and a snaking line around the bar. He learns a lot of names very quickly, and retains maybe ten percent of them. The dead are very welcoming, it turns out, and positively _aching_ for a taste of messy, complicated, oft-disappointing natural life. 

It’s going well, is the point. So when Sascha Bykov and his entourage finally do roll in around eleven, it’s a laughing, booming, rollicking cherry on top.

Eliot thinks he gets it now, what it means to be number four out of three-hundred-something in ‘social influence.’ Sascha whoops when he throws the front door open, clearly already plastered from someplace before this, and the whole room goes _fucking wild._

Not in a _check out which celebrity just walked into the club_ sort of way. Not even in a _the most popular guy in school just walked into the lesser house party_ sort of way. Just in a _some guy just walked into a room with some of his drunk friends in it, and also his drunk friends are literally everyone_ sort of way.

It tracks, he guesses.

“Eliot!” Sascha spies him over the head of the tiny Asian girl he’s talking to, and gives her a quick, friendly squeeze before dragging himself away. He wraps both of his big, junkyard crusher hands around Eliot’s shoulders. “What a housewarming! Excellently done, my friend.”

“Glad you could make it,” Eliot tells him. “Let’s get you a drink.”

So: he does shots with Sascha Bykov. Then again with Sascha _and_ Mi-jin, since she wanted in but noticed too late. Then _Jumpin’ Jumpin’_ comes on the speakers, and nobody in their right mind lets Destiny’s Child pass them by, and so Eliot lets himself be swallowed up. 

The world narrows, to a steady thrum of noise, heat, and thick, thriving energy. For the first time since he opened his eyes and had a sign on a wall assure him that _everything is fine,_ everything really is— fine.

It’s fine.

It’s good.

It’s great, even.

This is where he was always going to end up, sooner over later. Everyone back home will probably be impressed he lasted as long as he did. So if this is all it is— more Viking than Evangelical, all revelry before suffering, instead of skipping straight to punishment— he can work with that. It’s what he’s wanted all along anyway, right? Cast off all the shit and just… be this. Be him. Forever.

He ends up on the back patio, at some point. It’s mostly empty now, but he’s sweaty, he thinks, and the afterlife has served up the perfect approximation of a Mid-Atlantic spring night for them: cool and comfortable, with flickers of fireflies darting above the grass. 

Most everyone else is either still inside, bouncing along to nineties hits with varying degrees of nostalgia, or opted for the front veranda instead, where it’s quieter. Right now there’s just Rodrigo, getting some air; Ethan and Tobias, talking in low tones, and— 

The guy from that morning, set up in one of the lawn chairs with his heels tucked under him like a gremlin, smoking a cigarette. 

“Hey,” Eliot says. “It’s you.”

He doesn’t know what his name is.

Whatever, they’ll get there.

What’shisname looks up at the sound of Eliot’s voice, and then his whole face scrunches, wary. He’s wearing the exact same clothes he was wearing thirteen (?) hours ago.

“You invited me,” he answers, a touch defensive for someone who, Eliot recalls, didn’t want to come in the first place.

“So I did.” Eliot drops into another chair, leaving one empty between them in deference to the Bro Buffer. In Flagrante Inordinatio seems like he might be the type to spook easily. “Glad you could make it, neighbor."

The guy squints at him. "You know, you definitely exaggerated how much we're actually neighbors," he says, and oh, _hello,_ kitten claws. "I had to ask Janet where to go."

Eliot lets himself sprawl in the chair, elbows hooked over the armrests and legs stretched out in front of him. He closes his eyes, letting the alcohol fuck pleasantly with his internal sense of balance until the world is bobbing around him. 

"What I'm hearing,” he says, “is that you were _very_ interested in coming to my party."

“That’s not what I said.”

“Mmhm. You’re welcome.” 

His surly little companion snorts, but doesn’t say anything else. They stay like that for a while, in tolerable mostly-silence. Eliot isn’t sure how long. Time as a concept feels a bit tangential, in this place.

The guy exhales a long, slow breath. Eliot didn’t actually come out here to smoke, but the secondhand char filling up his lungs is starting to make him envious. He reaches for his breast pocket— except he doesn’t have the cigarette case anymore, does he, just the pack Janet gave him this morning, which he left on the counter inside.

_You Can’t Take It With You,_ blah blah blah.

He sighs, drops his head back, groans, “ _Shit,_ ”— except, for absolutely no fucking reason whatsoever, what actually comes out is, “ _Shirt._ ”

His eyes snap open. By the time he gets his bearings, Festive In Flannel is already watching him, brow arched and amused. He brings his cigarette back up to his mouth, fast, but not fast enough to cover his slanted little smile. 

“Yeah, uh.” He clears his throat, too pointed to be natural and too casual to be subtle. “You can’t swear here.”

Eliot stares at him. The world is still wobbling itself back into place. “Excuse me?”

“You— Seriously, you haven’t noticed this yet? It’s like a, uh, like a language filter.” The guy rolls his shoulders back and lifts his chin to the sky. “Uh, fork,” he says, at the exact same volume as before. “Shirt. Bench.” Then he looks back at Eliot, smiling too big, way too fucking earnest. “See?”

“You’re forking with me,” Eliot says, and _what_ the _actual_ fucking _fuck._

“Um.” His eyebrows go up and his lips purse, hard. He’s trying not to laugh. At _Eliot._ “I’m really not, no.”

“This _is_ Hell,” Eliot says into his hands, and— jesus. “Jesus, I’m allowed to say _that?_ ” He feels hysterical. Attractive Gremlin just frowns. “Is that a joke? Is this a prank?” 

“That’s actually a good question,” the guy says, like he’s surprised about it. He’s turning out to be kind of a bitch, and isn’t _that_ something? “Is it just because you used it as a proper noun? If so, then, like, what’s the cultural standard they’re basing this on? Like, if other people are hearing what we say translated into, I dunno, Russian or Italian or Chinese, and we say something that’s acceptable in English but not in their language, then—”

“Oh my god.” As far as catches go, it's not the worst, but it's still— god, the _worst._ “No. I need a drink.” He throws himself out of his chair, and sticks his arm out. “Get up.”

The guy glares up at him. “Uh, what?”

“Drinks,” Eliot says again, enunciating. “Get up, come with me.”

“Why do I have to go?”

Jesus. Like Eliot’s telling him to eat his fucking vegetables. “Do you need a reason?”

His eyes dart toward the sliding glass door. “I mean." He wiggles his still-glowing cigarette between two fingers. “I’m not really finished with—” 

“It’s my house,” Eliot says. “I literally could not care less. This is your fault, so smoke your cigarette and _come with me._ ”

He doesn’t wait. He doesn’t need to. He’s barely got the door a sliver of the way open before he hears a heavy sigh behind him, and the scrape of a lawn chair being pushed back.

_Actual_ debauchery is, apparently, fine in the eyes of the Afterlife Censorship Committee. Mi-jin is closing the deal with Sorority Girl Jess, there’s a loosely-defined smoke circle on the floor still going strong, and the impromptu dance floor is a small-but-dedicated, sweaty, glorious mess.

Thank whatever for small mercies.

Thank _himself,_ apparently.

He picks and weaves his way back to the bar. People have clearly been helping themselves, and good for them; there’s a charm and delight to a too-strong drink made with your own two, drunk hands that’ll never be matched by Janet and her bubbly customer service literalism, bless her not-heart.

His boy finds his way eventually. He squeezes through pockets of people with his hands held up high, and the still-burning tip of his cigarette turned conscientiously in towards himself. “Sorry,” Eliot hears him say. “Uh, s’cuse me. Sorry, I’m— Sorry.”

He pops out the other side stumbling and wide-eyed, like he’s never been in a crowded place before in his life, like he’s a lost little lamb, and good _god,_ Eliot could eat him alive.

He _still_ doesn’t know what his name is.

Blank Space hovers where he is, leaving way too much personal space between them, like Eliot might have forgotten the conversation they had ten seconds ago and would be shocked to find him standing beside him. 

Eliot’s not that drunk yet. And he is _always_ a good host.

Well, mostly.

“Your very enthusiastic neighbor banned me from my own wet bar,” Eliot tells him, fetching down a rocks glass and a bottle of rye. “All the love in the world for Janet, but she doesn’t make a Manhattan like I do.” 

“Yeah, um, actually, that’s—”

“ _Anyway,_ ” Eliot says over him. “I’m starting to suspect he could crush my head in one hand, so you’re on lookout duty.”

The guy frowns at him. “Sascha wouldn’t do that.” He reconsiders. “I mean, he probably _could,_ yeah, but he wouldn’t.”

“Not on purpose,” Eliot agrees. “What’re you drinking?”

He is always _eventually_ a good host.

The guy drifts closer to the bar. “Uh, I dunno,” he answers. He’s half-distracted, fidgeting with his cigarette, eyes darting all around, like he thinks he’s on _Dateline_ for people who smoke indoors. “Do you have beer somewhere?”

_Does Eliot have beer somewhere._ Jesus, he’s lucky he’s cute. “Try again.”

He scowls, but the look he gives the liquor shelf is too curious for Eliot to be worried about it. “Give me a break,” he says. “I turned twenty-one, like, six months ago.”

Eliot rolls his eyes. “Sure. And you expect me to believe you were an innocent, law-abiding miscreant up til then?”

“I mean, I expect you to believe that I was mostly drinking crappy beer and, like, cupcake vodka up til then.”

And… well. Hm.

“Fine,” Eliot says. “Point conceded. But just so you know, we don’t tolerate that—” _shit,_ is the word he’s looking for. He bites down on it, and the guy’s mouth quirks, knowing, “ _nonsense_ here.” He flips a second glass out onto the bartop. “Time to graduate, buttercup.” 

Troubled But Cute’s eyes flicker down. They catch on Eliot’s hands, on the movements of his fingers— and then he finally brings his cigarette back up to his mouth. If that’s not Freudian, Eliot doesn’t know what is. 

“Okay,” the guy says into the filter. He takes a quick, impulsive drag, and then exhales on a cough. “So, um, hit me, then. What d’you recommend?”

“Sit,” Eliot instructs, snapping his cocktail shaker down between them, “and let Daddy take care of you.”

  


* * *

  


He loosens up, eventually.

Eliot doesn’t even think it’s the alcohol that does it. The alcohol _helps,_ obviously, alcohol always helps, but it’s not the make-or-break moment it is with some people. The kid’s like a top on a string, that’s all: a bundle of wound-up potential energy that just needs the right sort of touch to trip.

(And Eliot’s always been happy to experiment.)

It starts with Sascha Bykov. Curiouser And Curiouser is in the middle of asking Eliot what has to be his sixth or seventh overly-analytical, miss-the-whole-goddamn-ecosystem-for-the-trees question about the drink he’s making— something to do with acids and bases, Eliot doesn’t fucking know— when Sascha sweeps up behind him and quite literally carries him off, big machine-gun arms wrapped around his narrow nerd chest, like King Kong and the chick from King Kong. 

“Yes!” Sascha booms, delighted, already dragging him back into the crowd. “You changed your mind! Good, good, good!” 

The guy gives Eliot a desperate, panicked look over the heads of his fellow bopping partygoers. Eliot gives him a smile and a fluttering wave goodbye. 

“Shots!” Sascha is shouting. “Mi-jin, one more shot!”

(“There’s a story there,” Eliot tells him some hazy amount of time later, “and I am _desperate_ for the details.”

“There is not,” he answers, ruffling his hair back from his temple. It's messier than it was before. _No story,_ Eliot's fine ass. “He’s just— like that.”

“Fine," he sniffs, "don’t tell me. I have my ways.”

The guy snorts, half-smiling, arms folded over the bar. He doesn’t have the last drink Eliot gave him anymore; he doesn’t even have the _glass,_ which Eliot knows from experience is either a very good sign or a very bad one. 

“Verdict on the pisco?” he asks.

“Mm.” The guy nods, remembering, and then shakes his head, _remembering._ “I liked the first one better.”

“Interesting,” Eliot says, and means it, surprisingly enough. He reshuffles the flavor profiles that are coming together in his head, and reaches for gin; the Nolet's, this time, for the peach and raspberry notes. “Ready for round three?”)

Later, Eliot spies him entertaining a trio of older women in colorful headscarves, all savage partiers in their own rights and still going strong. He does something that makes them all erupt in cooing applause, and he grins, so earnest and so proud and _so_ painfully oblivious to the cougar den he’s wandered into. 

One of them leans in close to his ear, her hand light on his bicep. She whispers something Eliot can only _begin_ to imagine— Nerd Chic nearly jumps straight out of his skin, and Eliot nearly spits his drink straight back into his glass laughing.

(He finds out after that it was a magic trick. _Close-up magic,_ The Nerdy And The Restless calls it, with overflowing, unironic relish. He gets all fired up about it, talking a mile a minute about _misdirection_ and _essential sleights_ and, for one briefly confusing detour, CGI. 

“So- so- so— wait.” Eliot thinks he’s stopping to breathe, maybe, but no, he’s just checking his pockets. “It’d be easier just to show you. Do you have, like, a quarter? Or a- or a button, or something? It just has to be small and round.”

Eliot has a bottle cap.)

After that, he spends what feels like _ages_ neck-deep in some argument with some guy who doesn’t look half as invested as he is in whatever they’re talking about. Eliot can’t hear anything they’re saying from his spot across the room, but Um, Actually is so expressive, from his face to his hands to his bowled-over, full body reactions, that it almost doesn’t matter. He counts out ready-to-go talking points on all ten of his fingers, rolls his eyes all through his conversational victim’s tepid response, and cuts his hand through the air between them like he could actually slice the kid’s jugular with it.

(Watching it only stays entertaining for so long. Eliot gets bored around the time the other guy starts looking good and truly dead inside; he cuts smoothly in from his boy’s left side, hooks their elbows together, and tugs him away into the crowd. 

“Hey!” QED whines at him. And it is a _whine,_ the likes of which can only be accomplished by the well and truly drunk. “I still— You cut me off. I was gonna—”

“You’re taking forever to finish that sling I gave you,” Eliot accuses. “It’s throwing off my calibration.”

“Uh-huh,” he answers, like he’s not listening. He stumbles a bit, but otherwise lets himself be dragged. “Whatever. I was winning anyway. You did that guy a favor.” 

“Oh,” Eliot says, “I absolutely did.”

The dance floor has thinned out by now. There’s still plenty of people, split into blissed-out trips and gossip sessions and sloppy hookups, but they’re more evenly distributed now, instead of congregating and moving and writhing together. 

_God,_ the cruel march of time, even in the afterlife. 

“Hey,” his boy says, abruptly planting his feet. It takes them both briefly off balance; he spills more of what’s left of his drink out onto Eliot’s rug, and doesn’t seem to notice. 

“Eliot,” he says again. He lifts his glass up to hide his smile behind the rim of it. “Hey, Eliot.” 

“Hey, you,” Eliot answers.

The smile gets bigger. He tries and fails to school it back down into seriousness. “So. Kinda weird question.”

Something in the pit of Eliot’s stomach lights up like the wick of a candle. _Kinda weird question._ From a boy like this one— his favorite kind, nervous and nerdy and oh _so_ curious— that’s almost always a good sign. Like, eighty-twenty odds in Eliot’s favor, easy. 

He leans in. “Yeah?”

His boy bobs his head. Bites his lip, to keep his smile down. Lifts his eyebrows high, innocent as anything, and then asks: “What's my name?”

Oh.

Busted.

“Well,” Eliot tries. Or— starts to try. His brain is all buzzy; he’d actually kind of forgotten that this was a thing he needed to remember.

What’shisname doesn’t seem pissed about it, at least. He laughs, even, which probably counts for something. "You don't know it, do you."

“ _Well,_ ” Eliot tries again. "What’s a name, really?” Promising start. Keep it rolling. Dig up, not down. “We all go by many things."

“I know your name,” Nerd Next Door says, and Eliot should maybe stop doing that. “Eliot.”

“To be fair,” Eliot says. “I introduced myself to you.”

He feels like he’s onto something. Something about manners being a thing. It’s just hard to put the thought all the way together, with this boy rocking back and forth on his heels like that. 

“And so, like, your plan was— what?” he says. “Ride the ‘hey, you’ train for literally eternity?”

“I have my ways,” Eliot says.

It’s true, but Something Something grins at him like it’s not. “You keep using that word,” he says, brow folded seriously together, even though his eyes are bright. He’s such a fucking nerd, and Eliot knows, because this is a reference he gets, in what he’s sure is a sea of ones he doesn’t. “I don’t think it means what you think it means.”

But the joke’s on him, because this time Eliot _does_ have his ways. At least one way. Whether it came to him two seconds ago or two hours ago is, truly, immaterial.

He twirls in place. “Janet!”

Shock blows the tipsy, teasing nerd confidence straight off his boy’s lovely, expressive face. “No, what?” His hand curls around the inside of Eliot’s elbow. It’s a warm, electric touch that zips straight up to his ear. “Hang on, wait, what’re you—” 

“Hi there!” Janet says, from their left.

Eliot spins around to face her. “Janet!” He only sways a little bit, and only _almost_ takes a tumble. “Janet.”

“Hi!” she says again. “How can I help?”

His mystery nerd is trying to escape. Eliot lassos him by the elbow and tugs him into his chest.

“Janet,” he says solemnly, “what is this young man’s name? Full, official, and legal only, please.”

“Wait,” Forever Nameless says, “I don’t think—”

Janet nods, all smiles. She answers: “Quentin Makepeace Coldwater.”

“Oh my god,” Eliot says.

“Oh my _god,_ ” Quentin _Makepeace_ _Coldwater_ groans into his hands.

It’s amazing. Incredible. More than he ever could have asked for.

“That is the absolute best answer you could have possibly given me,” Eliot tells her seriously. “Thank you, Janet. Truly.”

“It was the only answer I could have given you!” she says, positively delighted about it. “You are _so_ welcome.” And then she disappears.

Quentin ( _Coldwater_ ) has gone limp and defeated against him, so Eliot slides both arms around his shoulders and tips his chin thoughtfully against the crown of his head.

“I like her,” he decides.)

All to say: it’s a pretty good night.

  


* * *

  


In the end, the party sort of whimpers out. It’s disappointing, but on the whole not surprising; he’s a new face in a new scene, and that makes him an early stop, not a late one. He sees Sorority Girls Jess, Kayla, and Lindsay out just before two, and with them, any chance at a decent afterparty.

Truth be told: he’s not that broken up about it.

Last man standing is Quentin Makepeace Coldwater, sitting cross-legged on Eliot’s couch, rolling that same bronze bottle cap back and forth across his knuckles. He looks up when Eliot comes back in the room, already eager, already smiling. 

“Hey,” he says, “so I was thinking, I bet I could—”

And then he stops, abruptly. His gaze hovers somewhere just beyond Eliot’s shoulders for a second, and then it darts all around the room, in all directions, like the space just shimmered into existence around him. The empty space.

“Oh,” he says. Eliot watches self-consciousness wrap itself around him, hitch his shoulders up to his ears. “Am I—? Wow, okay, I should probably…”

He should. Probably. 

But, again— and he really cannot emphasize this enough— Eliot is not a good person. He’s never pretended to be. He’s alone in this big, empty house for the rest of… whatever, existence. Until the universe burns itself out, and maybe even beyond that, too. 

But not yet.

He diverts to the bar, and the wine fridge, and the stopped bottle of Romanée-Conti.

“How about this,” he says, turning back on his heel. “Help me kill this last bottle of welcome basket wine, and then I’ll let you go.”

Quentin smiles, a little, a slim crack on one side of his face. The tension in his shoulders unspools; not all the way, but some. “It took you this long to break out the wine?”

Eliot hands him a glass, and twists the stopper from the bottle. “This is the good stuff,” he tells him seriously. “Not fit for the unwashed masses.”

“Well then, um, you’re definitely wasting it on me,” Quentin says, but he holds the glass still anyway, so that Eliot can pour. “I’m not gonna be able to tell the difference.”

And— there are ways to play this. Eliot knows that. It wouldn’t even be hard; the ambience is all flickering firelight and heady red wine, and Quentin is already smiling up at him, eyes big and drunk and curious. He could go professorial, maybe: spin the vineyard’s sordid history, and then offer to teach him a thing or two about good wine. Make the tasting lesson more hands-on than it strictly needs to be. Let gentle brushes of fingers turn into a playful tuck of hair behind one ear, into a lingering touch on the jaw, into a slow, searching kiss.

He could do it. It’d be good, for both of them, probably. They’re fucking dead; they deserve something good.

He just—

He doesn’t feel like himself. He feels weird. It’s an off night.

(He thinks about a canary yellow file folder, hidden in a drawer upstairs.)

He pours his own glass. Sits in the chair opposite Quentin, instead of on the couch beside him. “Consider it the next phase of your studies,” is all he says. “We’re moving on to bigger and better things, kid.”

  


* * *

  


They kill the bottle. 

Or— Eliot does. He splits the last of the wine between them, filling his own empty glass back up and topping off Quentin’s half-full one. He even shakes it a little to make sure Quentin gets the last couple drops, before he lets it clatter back down to the rug.

It’s done. Finished. Killed dead.

“Should I be allowed to get drunk if that’s what killed me?” he asks.

He’s trying for a joke, but Quentin frowns at him like he’s being serious. Jesus, he’s so _serious._ When did they cross over from fun drunk into morose drunk? This is what he gets for following liquor with wine.

“I don’t really think anything here is about being allowed or not,” Quentin says.

That doesn’t sound right. You would think Heaven would have— _standards._ Or at least have something going for it besides being Earth: The Sequel, where Eliot gets just as fucked up as he did before, except with fewer overdrafts, better vintages, and none of the health consequences.

He settles on, “Lucky me,” and drinks.

They’re both sprawled out on the floor, on the rug, in front of the fire. Eliot isn’t sure how that happened, except that Quentin gets oozy and wiggly when he’s drunk, and kinda just, like, flopped out of the couch at some point, he thinks. And Eliot is nothing if not the consummate host, you see.

Quentin’s sitting up now, though. Lying on the floor is too lackadaisical for this Maudlin Wine Drunk zone they’ve wandered into, apparently. Eliot watches him do it, watches him fold himself up, limb by limb, legs pretzled underneath him and arms pulled in close to his torso, and is mostly impressed he doesn’t give himself the spins, with the kind of coordination it must require. 

He’s staring straight into the fire when he asks, “Do you remember it?”

Eliot can only really see him in profile, with his neck at the angle it’s at against the floor. He already forgot what they were talking about. “What?”

Quentin’s eyes dart toward him. His knuckles are white, where he’s got both hands wrapped around the bowl of his glass. His throat bobs. “Dying.”

Eliot rolls his head back to stare at the ceiling.

He tries, sort of. He thinks about it. He remembers the start of the night, getting ready in Mason’s cramped one-bedroom-den with six other people. He remembers Natalie picking a fight with him on the basement dancefloor of some overspun, overcrowded shithole, the soles of his shoes sticking to the laminate. He remembers wanting to leave, and Mason trying to convince him to stay, hands warm through his shirt at the small of his back. 

After that...

“Not really,” he admits. “It’s— fuzzy.”

He can feel when Quentin looks at him. Not just this time, always. His attention is _weighty_ in a way Eliot hasn’t really ever experienced before, like it’s this physical thing he tosses around with his eyes, like it’s a fucking bowling ball. 

“Call it an educated guess,” Eliot says, even though Quentin didn’t ask. He pats the empty belly of the wine bottle. “One can only have so many close calls before the universe finally sticks the landing, right?”

Quentin smiles, and it’s awful, for some reason.

“They told me, um.” His eyes drop down to watch himself swirl his glass in circles. He hasn’t had any more since Eliot refilled it. “They said they erase it. The memory. If it’s too— embarrassing, or...” His mouth thins. “Uh. Traumatic. It’s supposed to help with the, um, transition. I guess.”

Eliot hadn’t asked, when he arrived. He hadn’t even really thought about it until just now, until Quentin and all his buzzing, melancholy energy.

“I think I was probably just blackout,” he decides.

Quentin nods, jerky. Then he nods again, sharper, and _then_ he tips his head back and downs half his glass in one go.

Eliot smacks his knee with the back of his hand. “Cretin,” he snaps, and Quentin's mouth twists into an actual smile, and then the tension snaps, too. “Don’t disrespect my wine.”

“Nope,” Quentin says. “Uh, nope. Sorry.” He does it again, draining the rest of his glass. “I’ve officially been here, uh, all forking night, so—”

Eliot groans, digging his fingers into his eyes, but Quentin has the audacity to actually _laugh._

“God,” he grunts, as he stands. “I totally— I forgot. I still can’t believe they really enforce the- the stupid find-and-replace thing.”

“Liar. You love it.” Eliot throws both arms out across the rug. “You were positively _academic_ about it.”

“It can be both,” Quentin fires back. “It can be interesting and also, like, shirty.” 

And he must surprise himself again, because he honest-to-god _giggles,_ for the love of christ.

“Just go,” Eliot moans. “Leave. You are absolutely decimating my vibe, Coldwater.”

“Mmkay.” There’s a _plink_ of him setting his glass down somewhere Eliot can’t see. “Bye.”

“Lock the door behind you.”

“Yeah.”

It takes him some time, fiddling with the mechanism on both the inside and the outside of the door. It takes longer than it takes for Eliot to realize that it probably doesn’t matter, given that he’s already dead and all his belongings are instantly replaceable. But Quentin is focused, determined to get it right, and if Eliot tips his head back far enough he can watch him, upside-down.

“Okay,” Quentin says, when he finally gets it. “I’m going.” He steps outside, and then calls back in, like an afterthought: “See you later.”

“Yep,” Eliot calls back.

And the door shuts.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for all the nice comments, everyone! I'm so glad y'all are enjoying reading this as much as I am writing it. I'm planning on going back and replying to everyone (sorry in advance, I'm truly awful at replying in a timely manner), but wanted to get this chapter out first since you've already had to wait much longer than I hoped. Enjoy!

He wakes up, tired and sticky, but alive.

You know. In a manner of speaking.

That’s the thing, with all the 'window dressing'. Every day is normal. He wakes up like normal, washes his face and does his hair and picks out his outfit, like normal. He makes breakfast, goes for a walk, orders froyo from a smiley yogurt-ista. He throws a party, and flirts with a cute boy, and goes to bed drunk and sick of himself. Like normal. 

Mind, he’s not complaining. He’s had worse normals than this, and the afterlife could have easily gone after any of those in the interest of, like— justice, or retribution, or whatever. And he’s sure that’ll be coming down the pipe at some point, in some form or another, but for now this is fine. It’s a pleasant enough time killer, as much as that means anything anymore.

It’s just… he still sleeps, like normal. And everybody has that moment, right? That comfortable, hazy, in-between moment when you’re conscious but not really awake— and the way that moment snaps, under the weight of _fuck, my back hurts,_ or _shit, I slept through brunch,_ or _maybe I’ll just take the whooping if it means I don’t have to stick my whole hand up a goat’s vagina before the sun comes up,_ or, if he wants to be really laser-focused with his not-so-hypothetical examples: _oh, right, I died._

Anyway, he’s awake.

He rolls over onto his belly and tucks his cheek into the soft down of his pillow. It’s a nice bed: big enough for him to sprawl in, with firm, plush padding and cool silk sheets. The temperature’s just right for him to sleep naked and be comfortable, and he suspects it still would be even if he felt like bundling up. Which he never does, but, y’know, options. There’s room, literally and temporally and existentially, to bask; close his eyes for awhile, drift a bit, try to get a second-round, half-price version of that moment everybody likes so much.

He’s got an uncommonly clear memory of last night. (He doesn’t typically black out on accident anymore— in his experience that’s usually more fun for other people than it is for him— but his dear friend browning out has always been a tougher act to shake.) It is, surprisingly, on the tame side; he remembers Sascha Bykov taking on a self-imposed challenge to deadlift as many women as possible, and Rodrigo briefly clearing the dancefloor to goad Tobias into swing dancing with him to dubstep.

He remembers _Quentin Makepeace Coldwater_ in Janet’s best QVC presenter voice, and snickers down into the pillow. 

Overall, not a bad showing. Points off for the early finish, and for not managing to make the ‘early finish’ double-entendre conversion, and for weird, late-night conversations about death and the universe, but still. Solid B minus.

He stretches, and one untucked corner of the top sheet twines languorously around his ankle. It skims across his skin, against the grain of hair, bright and staticky, and… hmmm. There it is. Nerves sparking up like lit matches beneath his skin: heated, fricative, aching.

God, he could’ve managed _something_ last night, right? Scored a handie for his trouble, at minimum; the loud kid with the sloppy fade would’ve been up for it by midnight, of that he’s absolutely certain. Why hadn’t he, again? 

(Well, fine. He knows why he didn’t go for _that._ But still: no excuse.)

He lifts his hips enough to get one hand underneath him. He palms himself slowly, enough to get a rhythm of muted, lazy pleasure— closes his eyes, sighs into his pillow— drifts— 

There are warm hands framing his hips from behind. A whisper of breath on the back of his neck. He slides up to his knees, and they slide up with him, a curl of heavy, promising heat down his back and between his thighs. They bow their head between his shoulderblades, and there’s a tickle of fine, soft curls. They kiss him there, open-mouthed and hot.

“Nat’s still twenty minutes out,” Mason is saying, the points of his teeth sharp against Eliot’s skin, his voice husky and grating even in half-dream-half-memory. “How about it?”

— Ugh. 

No. 

Fuck, now he’s awake again.

He scrubs his other hand against his eyes, to blot out sleep and the flickering afterimage of Mason Sandoval. He’s clearly going to have to be a little more deliberate with his steering, here. Fine. He flops onto his back, and thinks about— whatever, a generic masculine presence is good enough to start. He doesn’t really care; he just needs something for his brain to latch onto long enough for his cock to get with the program.

He sighs back down into his pillows again, stretches through his toes again, closes his eyes again. He lets his knees fall open, and puts his Generic Masculine Presence between them. 

Ordinarily he’d be fine with some abstract concept of weight and solidity, with disembodied hands and a smudged-out face, but he’s steering, so, fine. They’d be— smaller, softer. They’d have straighter hair and a squarer jaw. They’d have a voice that doesn’t feel like someone’s dragging his eardrums against the fine edge of a microplane. 

(Alright, focus.)

He skims his palm down his chest, across his ribs. They’d stretch out over him, warm lips at his neck and one broad hand at his waist. They’d be… clumsy, probably, but earnest. Eager. With pretty flushed cheeks, from excitement and embarrassment and firelight. 

He slides his fingers down the groove of his hip, and lets his nails curl against the skin of his inner thigh. They’d be curious. Exploratory. They’d be surprised by his size, but not intimidated by it. Correction: they’d be _fascinated_ by it, wrapping their palm— his palm— around the half-flagged heft of it, just to see how much bigger it could get.

 _“Holy shit,”_ they’d say. _“Can I- Can I try—?”_

Eliot feels himself breathe out, harshly.

Yeah. His cock has, officially, gotten with the program.

He gets a hand properly around himself, and everything kind of fragments out from there. Hands, mouth, tongue. What they lack in skill they make up for in creativity and enthusiasm and sheer audacity, trying to go all the way to the base and not quite making it, having to pull back and breathe and try again.

They sit back to circle the head of his cock with their tongue, just the flat tip of it, like- like chasing granules of sugar around the rim of a glass. Their eyes lift to his, and they’re soft and blue and so— 

His orgasm hits hard, and it hits sideways. 

It’s less the sweet, blurry-at-the-edges release he was angling for, and more like a- a fucking pickup truck backfiring in a Kmart parking lot. Violent and sudden, the sort of shock to the system that rattles straight through you. Which is _not_ a stroll down sense-memory lane he wants to be taking while also trying to catch his own jizz in his hand.

Awareness shatters back in; he’s sweating and panting and his core muscles are aching. He flops back down into the cool embrace of his weirdly-perfect sheets, sated in the same way he would be if he’d just plucked an ingrown hair, or puked his guts out. So: not good, or comfortable, or relieved, just… finished. 

He stares at the ceiling. He’s tired, and he’s _sticky,_ but— 

Well.

He’s awake, anyway.

  


* * *

  


He gets up. He washes his face. He does his hair, and picks out his outfit.

His _outfit,_ which he grossly miscalculates, because when he steps out onto the veranda, it’s not into the sweet, idyllic spring he sort of just assumed was a perpetual state of being here— but instead into dead-center autumn, with absolutely no buildup, transition, or _summer_ to speak of.

The newly flowering trees around his very cute cottage-slash-mausoleum have apparently bloomed and flourished and aged overnight; they blend beautifully together now, all heavy with an aesthetic-perfect ratio of red, orange, and gold leaves. The air is crisp and striking, instead of mild and with an improbably low pollen presence. It’s positively picturesque. 

He loses five minutes just standing there on the veranda. He needs to go back in and change, he clashes something awful, he’s a lot of things but he’s not the sort of person that goes out in mid-October-Question-Mark wearing pink pastel linen— but instead he just _stands_ there, staring out across the yard, feeling… insane, frankly. 

Not even about the nature-documentary-montage timeskip; that’s honestly not any more weird than anything else that’s happened to him in the last week or so. About— the rest of it. Everything. Him, standing here with his hand on the doorknob of the two-story house he woke up in, which belongs to him, looking out across the yard and appreciating the landscaping, like— like— 

Jesus. What a fucking morning.

He goes back inside and changes his clothes. It sets his morning back another forty-five minutes, and it’s barely even worth it; the aubergine trousers he finds at the back of his closet are the only saving grace for the entire outfit. 

He could spend more time on it. It’s not like he has anywhere to be, or anything to do. But he was leaving, alright, he wants to _leave._ So he puts on his uninspired navy blue button-down, and he fucking leaves.

He peels off into the first halfway-decent breakfast option he sees: a bakery called _Baked Goods And Good Coffees_ a few blocks away, perched right on the edge of the bustling little square at the center of the neighborhood. He’s hit the tail end of their morning rush; he can spy a line through the frosted glass of the front door, but not a long one, and the tables outside are mostly clear, save for a few people nursing tea and books and, for some godforsaken reason he really never needs to hear, newspapers. 

He pulls the door open, casts back over his shoulder with the full force of polite muscle-memory, and finds Quentin Makepeace Coldwater coming up the walk behind him.

He’s adjusted for the season by wearing a hoodie over the flannel. He’s got that cross-body messenger bag hanging precariously and nonsensically over only his right shoulder, and, this time, just the one book clutched against his chest.

Eliot holds the door open for him.

Quentin lifts his head when he realizes his path is clear, in preparation for, Eliot assumes, a rote and polite ‘thank you.’ He looks tired, halfway zoned-out, expression empty of recognition— and then he jerks, eyes going big and round, like his soul re-entered his body (or his... whatever into his whatever) specifically to remind him of this one awkward social obligation. 

Eliot waves, sort of, or at least raises two fingers of his free hand in clear acknowledgement. He doesn’t get much back, besides even wider eyes and a tight, nervous smile, but that’s fine. The clarity of daylight and hangovers; it comes for everyone.

(Assuming hangovers are a thing in the afterlife, which they might not be. _Eliot_ doesn’t have one, at least, which seems improbable after rounding out the night with most of a bottle of burgundy, but he’s not a fair bar to be measuring anyone against, if he’s being honest.)

They both step inside. The door chimes when it shuts.

“Uh, hey,” Quentin says, shuffling into line behind him.

Eliot takes his sunglasses off and tucks them into the collar of his shirt. “Hey.”

Quentin’s brow does its fold-y thing again, like that was somehow not the response Eliot was supposed to give him. He follows up with, “Um,” and then nothing else.

It’s awkward. 

Eliot can deal with awkward. He’s carried entire conversational circles on his back before; one stint of five-second small talk with a boy he _didn’t_ fuck last night is barely a blip on the radar. He almost doesn’t want to, though. He just came here for a scone and some coffee to pour his whiskey into, not to hold some kid’s hand through basic human interactions. The line is moving quick; all he has to do is ride it out.

He could do that. Get his breakfast in blissful-if-awkward silence, take it out to the patio or to the park or home, even. It would take, what, a couple minutes to eat, maybe fifteen or twenty if he gets coffee, too? And then he’d have the rest of his day sprawled out in front of him: limitless, empty, boring. 

He glances over, and Quentin is staring at his feet. He doesn’t look sad, or mopey, or dejected; he looks thoughtful, maybe frustrated. It’s a bitch, when all that alcohol-soaked confidence doesn’t translate to the breakfast line the next morning. Eliot knows the feeling.

“Crazy weather we’re having,” he drawls.

It’s sort of like watching a computer reset. Quentin’s eyes dart back up; he looks, for a second, surprised, and then it suspends there on his face like his brain doesn’t know what the next appropriate emotion is.

“Oh.” He glances out the window, and then when he looks back his face is— well, it’s not _relaxed,_ but it’s a degree in the right direction. He’s even smiling a little, the shadow of a familiar wry uptick at the corner of his mouth. “Yeah, sorry,” he says. “That happens. I think, uh, you know… Michael and Janet are trying their best? I think they know variety is good. But I don’t know if they really _get_ what the, like, actual human experience of a season is. To them it’s all… backdrops of Hallmark movies, or something.”

“Well, certainly can’t fault them for the aesthetic,” Eliot says. “Some warning would’ve been nice, though.”

“Yeah,” Quentin says, on a heartening half-laugh. “Uh, if you get any warning whatsoever for, like, anything around here, let me know. Because I’d sure like some.”

Eliot’s next in line. He came here for breakfast, so he picks out a nice parmesan chive scone and an Irish coffee, because now that he’s had the thought, he’s firmly on board. It’s free anyway, so... who cares. 

It takes longer to be handed his order than it does to make it; he steps aside to let the line continue on, and finds a pretty, painted ceramic mug and a little pocket of wax paper already waiting for him, piping hot. 

“Yeah, hi,” he hears Quentin say to the cashier, or— whatever it’s called, when someone you buy something from doesn’t want any cash in exchange. “Can I do the, um, pourover, please? Medium, yeah. Uh, to-go. And, uh...” He leans over to squint at the shiny display case. “Oh, bear claws look good today. Can I have one of those?”

He seems surprised to find Eliot still there, when he turns around. Even though, again, the whole thing takes a couple seconds max, for the both of them.

“So it’s like regular seasons,” Eliot says, tilting his shoulders toward the door, “but just with the homely parts cut out?”

Quentin scurries forward to get there before him. “Oh, uh,” he says. “Kind of.” He’s carrying too much already, so he has to pop the door open with his hip and then catch it with his elbow to keep it there. “It’s like, uh— they switch them on and off? Like, there’s not a pattern, or at least not one that I’ve been able to pick out.” He shifts, letting the base of the door drop against his ankle instead, so that Eliot has enough room to pass by. “It might be like this for a few weeks, and summer for, like, a day, and then spring again for a month, and then winter for— you get the picture.”

It’s all very elaborate. Quentin barely seems to notice, though; his hair has fallen into his face and he doesn’t have the free hands to fix it, but he still smiles when Eliot lifts his chin in grateful solidarity. 

“Sure,” Eliot says. He scans the open patio for a table; there’s a good one tucked into the corner, under a spot of sun but with an umbrella, at the perfect angle to watch people in the square. “You’re saying I need to rearrange my closet.”

Quentin shimmies his way out from under the door to let it fall shut again. “I… guess?” There’s something warmly incredulous in his voice, like he’s not sure if he’s the one being teased or doing the teasing. “Do you, like— By season?”

“Do you not?”

“I hang up my jackets?” Then, sheepish: “Uh, the nice one, anyway.”

The nice _one._ Good god.

Eliot sets his saucer down on the table. The chime of ceramic on metal seems to snap Quentin out of the flow of his comfortable social reverie; he locks up again, hovering awkwardly far away. He glances over his shoulder at the patio gate and then back again.

“Anyway,” he says, restlessly thumbing at the cardboard sleeve of his very intentionally mobile cup.

There’s some déjà vu to it. 

“You can sit, if you want,” Eliot says. He sits, puts his feet up in one of the other chairs, and spreads a hand out to offer the remaining two. “But only if you promise not to horrify me with any more details about your alleged _’closet.’_ ” He sets his sunglasses low on the end of his nose, pointed. “My stomach can’t handle the stress.” 

And Quentin goes red, all up the back of his neck, but whatever short circuit was going on in that brain of his successfully cuts out. He smiles, a little unsure, a little wry. Most importantly, he sits.

“Uh, yeah,” he says, letting his book clatter to the table. It’s called _Inside Magical Lexicons: Language Building in Modern Fantasy._ “That’s definitely me, and not the eight hundred extra shots of espresso you ordered.”

“So long as we agree,” Eliot returns mildly, lifting his cup to his lips with one hand and flicking the book’s front cover open with the other. “Anyway, I’m going to need a full explanation. _Please_ tell me you speak Elvish.” 

Quentin’s blush creeps up to his ears. “That’s not what it’s about,” he says, which isn’t a ‘no.’ “It’s more like, um, the- the linguistic foundations that go into—”

It's about how bored old men dreamt up their elaborate fake languages, is the gist Eliot gets. Quentin goes on about it for a while.

But he’s got time aplenty, now.

  


* * *

  


Lacking in any better option— or any option at all— Eliot... integrates. Sort of.

If anything, Quentin was being generous about the Hallmark thing. Seasons go up and down like backdrops on a stage, each one as flawless and camera-ready as the others. There are clearly favorites being played, with spring and fall getting longer and more frequent limelight than either summer or winter, but whatever. Eliot’s decided to lean into it. It keeps his wardrobe fresh, and his social calendar on its toes.

He’s careful not to overreach; part of cultivating a presence is knowing when to pull back. He keeps things simple for a while: a few garden parties here and there for spring, a lightly harvest-themed potluck for fall, and some lower-key soirées for winter that are mostly excuses to practice mulling wine.

The next big-ticket item is a backyard barbeque he hosts in honor of a foray into summer that lasts more than three days. It’s an easy no-brainer; he’s got plenty of green space, some experimental flirtations with different dry rubs, and, really, who doesn’t appreciate an excuse to day drink now and again?

It goes alright. Maybe a C plus, this time around. The good news is that he manages to retain a small-but-quality cache of regulars: Rodrigo, who shows up already talking about _cornhole,_ from which Eliot is powerless to divert him; Mi-jin and Jess (formerly Sorority Girl Jess— she’s still a sorority girl, but Eliot likes her now), who arrive separately but at the same time, which adds a truly delicious layer of sexual tension to the whole affair; Sascha Bykov, fashionably-but-jovially late, as is his due; and drawn not far behind in Sascha’s wake, Quentin Coldwater.

(“Don’t start,” Quentin says the moment Eliot catches his eye, as if it’s _Eliot’s_ fault that Quentin’s relationship with his burly Eastern European neighbor is an intrigue fit for television. “I need a drink.”

“Ah, that ancient _cri du cœur,_ ” Eliot sighs, draping one arm across his shoulders. “I know it well. This way.”)

All the time in-between is... well. In-between. Eternity is eternity, and Eliot does his best with what he’s been given, put it like that. At worst he’s bored every now and then, when he’s between events and only has the neighborhood’s extraordinarily family-friendly set of activities to choose from.

They’re not all bad. He’s sure they’re fascinating in the right amounts, to the right people. It’s just that he can only go to a zoo full of extinct animals so many times on his own before he knows what to expect, and he’s not really the type to buddy-up. He’s a social creature at heart, sure, but he doesn’t really— _do_ friends. 

(Well. He does. But he’s always considered the term ‘fuckbuddy’ both more accurate and more succinct than ‘friends with benefits’.) 

Some girl freshman year of college had once drunkenly accused him of being a ‘fake extrovert,’ whatever the fuck that’s supposed to mean, after talking to him twice at a party and then throwing up in her boyfriend’s lap. Eliot just thinks he’s more independent than most, and more transient than most; a loose circle of fun acquaintances has always suited his needs perfectly fine.

He has that. Mi-jin frequents the same art museum he does, the one with the rotating collection of undiscovered and unpublished works by various modern artists, living and dead. Sascha’s morning walk is apparently deliberately designed to intersect with as many people as possible, so Eliot’s daily chat with him is really only a matter of when and where. 

And, it turns out, he and Quentin are both especially fond of that same little bakery a few blocks down, just off of the center square.

They run into each other a lot. Not always, but a lot. Quentin has the exact same coffee order every time, but he always gets a different pastry, in no particular order, like he’s throwing a dart at the all-free-all-the-time chalkboard menu.

“Yeah, hi,” Quentin says, on a rare day when he’s ahead of Eliot in line. Eliot considers his own schedule fairly regular, but Quentin’s seems to vary across entire hours; Eliot imagines the days they miss each other are the ones when Quentin shows up mid-afternoon. “Can I do the, um, pourover, please?”

“Go for the puits d’amour today,” Eliot whispers over his left shoulder. “Definitely.”

Quentin ignores him, fully committed to his script. “Medium, yeah,” he says. “Uh, to-go. And—” He cuts Eliot a sardonic look, and then leans over the display case, squinting at the description cards. “Two of the, uh—” 

“Puits d’amour,” Eliot tells the boy behind the counter. He shimmies up and around to Quentin’s side, curling one hand over his far shoulder. “And a cappuccino for me. Double shot, if you please, for here. Merci.”

Quentin sighs, and wriggles his shoulders, but he doesn’t pull away. (And _he_ has the nerve to call _Eliot_ ‘theatrical.’) They wait out the half-second for their order together: a pretty ceramic mug for Eliot, the classic cardboard cup for Quentin, and a stamped paper bag for the pastries that says _Bake again soon!_ on it.

“Doing that defeats the purpose of the line, you know,” Quentin says, when they’re back outside. “I’d be ticked if I was one of those people behind us.”

“The line doesn’t have a purpose,” Eliot counters. His favorite table is open, right at the edge of the patio; he drops artfully into the seat he leaves designated for himself, and spreads one hand out toward the others. “Stay for a bit,” he says, even though he already knows it won’t work. “I want to gossip.”

Quentin is trailing behind him, picking through the to-go bag. “I, uh, can’t, actually,” he says. “I kinda planned my whole morning out. Here.” He comes up with one decorative cardboard pastry box, and sets it on the edge of Eliot’s table. “This better be as good as you say it is.”

“Baby,” Eliot coos, snapping the lid open, “when have I ever disappointed you?”

“Yeah, I’m gonna do you a favor and not answer that.” 

There’s a miniature plastic fork that comes complimentary in the box; it is, inexplicably, also just the right size for Eliot’s hands. “Savage, Coldwater,” Eliot tells him, scooping a bit of cream from the top of his pastry. “We’ll make an embroidered silk satin settee out of you yet.”

A fancy bench. 

Because, you see, _bitch_ is verboten— even as a compliment, which is how Eliot prefers to use it.

“Those jokes aren’t funny to anyone but you,” Quentin says.

“Not a joke,” Eliot answers. “I’m simply operating within given parameters.” He sets his sunglasses on his face, a sure and classic dismissal. “Anyway, have fun with your mystery morning. Don’t forget to thank me later.”

“Sure,” Quentin says. His sarcasm is, for the record, not appreciated. “Thanks.”

And then he— doesn’t leave.

He’s shifting from foot to foot, one hand tangled up in the strap of his messenger bag. “Oh,” he says, pretending to remember something he’s probably been thinking about this entire time. “So, um, I was gonna come find you later but since you’re, y’know,” he gives Eliot’s table a vague, expansive gesture, “here. I wanted to tell you, I’m not gonna be able to make it to the thing tomorrow.”

Eliot has to think about it. He doesn’t remember him and Quentin making plans, except— right. There is a _thing_ coming up, unofficially apple-themed, for fall; Eliot is making cider. He remembers mentioning it in passing to Quentin a few days ago.

“The thing,” he echoes, setting his chin in one hand.

“Sorry,” Quentin says, like he’s genuinely remorseful about, like, throwing off Eliot’s imaginary headcount or something. “I promised Fatima I’d help her out with— um. She wants to rearrange her living room? I guess? And she said that she doesn’t like asking Janet to do things for her, which, honestly, like, I get. I mean, Janet’s great, obviously, but there’s something about making- uh, having the person who waits on our every stupid whim present as a woman—” Eliot watches him make the conscious decision to cut himself off: it’s a flutter of eyelashes, a flat, self-conscious smile, and a helpless, rolling shrug. “So. I’m spending tomorrow afternoon moving furniture instead.” 

It’s so ludicrous a premise that, coming from Quentin, it circles from _almost definitely a lie_ right back around to _unquestionably the truth_. Fatima most definitely does not give a shit about asking Janet for favors. Eliot suspects that Quentin knows that, but also that Quentin can’t fathom what the potential ulterior motive could be.

Something must show on Eliot’s face; he’s not sure what, but Quentin apparently misinterprets it, because his mouth slides into a flat little smile. “Yeah,” he says, gesturing vaguely to himself. “I think she, uh, might’ve missed the memo on what she’s working with, here.”

“Oh, I think she knows exactly what she’s working with,” Eliot tells him. Fatima is a brilliant old bitch and Quentin has a great ass. Eliot would never dream of judging. “You were going to track me down just to tell me you couldn’t make it to my party?”

Quentin frowns. “Well, yeah.”

“Most people would just not show up, you know.”

The frown deepens, somehow. Astonishingly, Quentin manages to do it with just his eyes. “Sure, but we’re friends,” he says, like it truly is that simple. “That’d be a- a crappy thing to do.”

And that’s—

Oh.

Eliot focuses on his pastry. He cuts into it, straight across, so that the rich, red center spills out into the box. “I wouldn’t have minded,” he says, honestly. Probably. “But I appreciate the thought. I’ll know now to cut back on the prepackaged instant noodles.”

Quentin must see something on his face again. He must misinterpret it again. Because his own expression— falls, a little, in a pinched, controlled way that tells Eliot he’s trying very hard not to show it at all. This is a not-so-rare moment where Eliot can watch in real time: Quentin’s brain swerving headfirst into some impossible to predict alternate interpretation.

“Um,” he says. “I mean, unless you didn’t— Sorry, I guess I kinda just assumed—”

“It’s a standing invitation,” Eliot interrupts. He’s learned that he more or less has to interrupt, before Quentin buries himself in the hole he’s digging. “So yes, please feel free to accept or decline at your leisure.”

Quentin’s expression clears, which is good. As hilarious as Eliot’s sure it would be, for him to have fucked this up before he even realized he’d gotten started, he doesn’t— _actually_ want Quentin to come away with the wrong assumption, here.

“Okay,” Quentin says. He shuffles his feet. Tucks his hair behind one ear. “Then, um—” 

And _then_ he ducks into what Eliot can only assume is a parody of a quarter-bow. He almost definitely intended it as a dig, but in the moment it becomes just— so much more. It’s awkward as hell, made worse by how clearly not committed to the bit he is, and his form is all off, so it looks more like a hunch than anything else. 

It is truly, bafflingly, unspeakably cute. 

“I respectfully decline and, uh, send my regrets,” Quentin says. He has to blow his hair out of his eyes. “That I can’t make it to your… whatever you called it.”

Eliot doesn’t remember calling it anything. “Docking for apples,” he says, just for the look on Quentin's face.

“Jesus.” But Quentin’s smiling when he says it, so it’s fine. He shifts the strap of his bag higher on his shoulder. “Okay, I actually have to go now. I’ll see you— later, I guess? Let me know how it goes.”

Eliot sprawls backwards in his chair. He sighs, pressing sweet jam down onto his tongue. “No need,” he says. “I already know.”

“Okay,” Quentin says. “I’m leaving.”

“It’s a gathering for the ages. Unlike anything anyone’s ever seen, living or dead.”

Quentin lifts one hand over his shoulder as he turns around. “Bye, Eliot.”

“Can you imagine missing out on something like that? Voluntarily? An authentic embroidered silk satin settee would never.”

“ _Bye,_ Eliot.”

  


* * *

  


So, he has a friend now.

That’s something.

  


* * *

  


Quentin’s ‘true essence’ is a little one bedroom apartment on the fifth floor of his walk-up. His _walk-up._ The building doesn’t have a goddamn elevator, to say nothing of Quentin’s apartment having more than six hundred square feet of space. 

“I don’t know,” is Quentin’s enlightened response to the issue. “I guess I never really thought about it? It’s just a couple of flights.” He cranes his neck over the railing. “Stay down there if it bothers you so much.”

Eliot starts taking the stairs two at a time. “It’s the afterlife,” he argues. “Anything could be _literally_ anything. But they couldn’t magic in an elevator?”

“Have you ever been in an elevator with more than three or four other people?” Quentin says. When Eliot makes it to the landing, he’s already bent in front of his door— 5Q, cute— keys jangling in the lock. “It’s like, everybody has this collective fight-or-flight response in a three by three box, all at the same time, and we just trust everybody else to ignore it. I’d rather take the stairs.”

Eliot does, in fact, have one particularly memorable experience of being in an elevator with more than three or four other people. 

It may have gone in another direction.

“You and I are _so_ different,” he marvels to the ceiling.

Quentin shoots him a slanted smile over one shoulder, as he swings the door open. “Yeah, uh. I coulda told you that.”

It’s a corner unit, and _bright._ Even this late in the afternoon, the main living area is awash in natural light, thanks to a few window placements that seem… spatially-questionable, at best. (The one on the eastern wall should absolutely open up into his neighbor’s living room, but instead it's a lovely view of a public garden.) It’s got a nice, neutral palette (all navy blues and dark grays and soft blacks), some of the plushest rugs Eliot’s ever seen, and many truly overstuffed throw pillows. There’s a modest TV opposite the couch, and beside that, a glass case full of a veritable resin menagerie of nerdy, fantastical creatures, most of which Eliot doesn’t even know the names of.

(It’s also on the top floor. Because the building is, quote, “dimensionally transcendental.” When Eliot had asked what the everloving fuck that was supposed to mean, Quentin had only smiled at him, shrugged, and answered, “It’s bigger on the inside.”) 

“You don’t have to say anything,” Quentin says, apropos of nothing. He slinks into the room with his shoulders hunched. “I don’t— I mean, I don’t really get it either. But it’s nice enough.” 

Eliot thinks it’s very nice, actually. He’s almost jealous, even; his own little fortress of solitude doesn’t have nearly this many windows.

“I think your library exploded,” he says instead, because the entire front room is full of books.

(That’s why they’re here, allegedly. Picking up a new book, since Quentin ‘accidentally’ finished the one he already had, which Eliot doesn't think is a real thing that happens to anyone.) 

There is, of course, the fact that the northern wall is made entirely out of floor-to-ceiling bookcases, but that’s not even where the _this room is full of books_ vibe is coming from. It’s all the _other_ books, scattered all over the room: hardcover textbooks and slim paperbacks and spiral-bound notebooks— some laid open to random pages, others stuffed full of those colorful sticky bookmarks— on the coffee table and the couch and the bar counter between the living room and the kitchen.

“Oh,” Quentin says, like he’s just now noticing them. “No, these aren’t mine. I mean— I asked Janet for them. I was doing some research, I guess.”

"Research," Eliot repeats. "You're dead and you're doing research?"

Quentin shrugs, not looking at him. He fiddles with the pointed corner of one of the not-his books, drawing it back and forth across his thumbnail.

“I was at Columbia,” he says after a second, and yeah, Eliot can _absolutely_ see that. Eager little Ivy Leaguer, falling asleep in a library stack. “Um, undergrad. I didn’t, uh, get to finish my bachelor’s thesis, so I’ve been, I guess, revisiting it.”

Oh.

It’s weird. On the surface, this is absolute bottom-of-the-barrel small talk: _oh, where did you go to school? what did you study? your thesis, that’s so interesting, what’s it about?_ But it’s not the same like this, is it? In this place. Dancing around— all of it.

It’s weird, Eliot thinks, to have to talk about your life like it’s a shitty TV show. A serial that doesn’t make the full season order. Some half-baked story that ends midway through the second act, in the middle of a sentence, in the middle of a word. 

To be fair, Eliot doesn’t really have that problem. He only ever had one real goal in life, and he managed it when he was eighteen and mainlining red bull to keep awake the whole way down I-70. Everything after that was just… bonus, really.

But Quentin— He must, right? 

He must have had... goals, or plans; he seems the type to go as far as a lofty dream or two. Some _and then_ to tack on to his blue ribbon bachelor’s. And then the master’s, and then the PhD, and then the cushy adjunct professor gig that lets him settle down somewhere in Brooklyn. 

Eliot can see it, plain as day. The notion sits in his chest, cold at the edges, like it’s letting in a draft.

“English?” he hazards.

Quentin smiles tightly; not at him, but at the bookcases. “I mean, you’re at least half right.” He picks the book up, and from this angle Eliot can see the title is _The Phenomenology of Spirit._

“Comparative Lit, and, uh.” He squints at the cover like he’s embarrassed about it. “Philosophy,” he admits, and Eliot’s— surprised.

Not necessarily about the combination. It wasn’t his first guess, maybe, but it fits around Quentin the same way _I was at Columbia_ does. Anxious little supernerd twisting himself into knots over the phrasing of some abstract and impractical thought experiment? Writing an inscrutable, hundred-page thesis about how it connects to the plots of seven different Renaissance-era epics? Maybe it _should’ve_ been Eliot’s first guess.

It's just— he’d never describe Quentin as _shy,_ is the thing, even though he knows most other people might. He gets why they would; there’s a logic to it, even if that logic is lazy and wrong. People use ‘shy’ all the time as shorthand for the things Quentin actually is, like ‘awkward’ (check), ‘jumpy’ (check), ‘reserved’ (eh, maybe 60-40), or ‘nerdy’ (jesus _fuck,_ check).

He's not, though. Not most of the time, excepting, well… right now, maybe. He finishes telling Eliot about his double-major in English and Philosophy, and then he turns away, shrinking a bit, letting the long ends of his hair swing into his face when he bends down to neaten the books on the coffee table into a stack.

And Eliot’s not, you know, _actually_ clueless, even though sometimes he thinks he might like to be.

He isn't sure what to say. They’re friends, sure, in a lonely, navigating-death-before-30 sort of way, but he doesn’t— _know_ Quentin, like, at all. He feels like he’s playing that old computer game with the mines, knowing he’s one step away from fucking the whole thing up, but not knowing which direction it’s in. 

“Lucrative,” he says, loftily neutral. Taupe instead of tan.

Quentin tucks his hair behind his ear on the right side, and lets the left keep hanging in his face, like a curtain that keeps Eliot from seeing his eyes. He laughs, sort of. “Yeah, I wasn’t— um. I wasn’t really thinking about that, at the time.”

“Well,” Eliot says, beginning to pick his way across the living room. It’s harder than it looks, when your standards for grace are as high as his are. “Not that this place isn’t nice, but if you ever get tired of the scenery, mine has a big bay window with a nook in it. Some people like to use those for reading, or so I’m told.”

Quentin looks at him, startled. Not just surprised— genuinely taken aback. “What?”

“Standing invitation,” Eliot reminds him, with a shrug. “Also, I would be an entrancing philosopher.”

Quentin keeps twisting his fingers in the hem of his sweater; it’s left the collar askew, so Eliot reaches up to fix it for him. Originally, Eliot might have pegged him as the type to be weird about this, the type of man that’s cagey about his personal bubble, especially where it overlaps with other men. But he holds still, lifting his chin up like he thinks Eliot might need the extra room. 

“You’d be, like, a pop philosopher,” he corrects. It’s a volley that falls completely flat, smacks straight into the center of the net, but Eliot recognizes the effort that it is. “I’m, uh. Not really in on the youtube livestream scene.”

Eliot finishes with his collar, smooths his hand over and around his left shoulder, and says, “Everyone needs a vice.”

And Quentin _does_ laugh, that time, tiny but real.

“Segue into,” Eliot goes on, patting his breast pocket for his cigarettes with his other hand, “I’m going to go smoke on your balcony now. Come get me when you’ve found your book in this mess.”

He gives Quentin’s shoulder a firm, grave squeeze. “Follow the sound of my voice if you get lost in the labyrinth, Theseus.”

Quentin does this stiff, fluttery little eye roll, like he learned how from watching a documentary. “She gave him thread,” he says, exactly like the pedantic _I was at Columbia_ nerd Eliot knows now he's always been. “In the story.”

“I’m not unravelling this cravat for you,” Eliot tells him breezily. He pushes off to teeter the rest of the way to the sliding glass door. “You’re cute, Coldwater, but you’re not _that_ cute.”

  


* * *

  


Quentin’s very serious about the whole thesis thing, it turns out. 

He doesn’t _have_ to write all of it from scratch, apparently; Janet is fully capable of replicating his entire half-finished draft from memory. But he is anyway, because ‘his perspective is shaped by his lived experience’ and ‘none of what he wrote before would be true to the person he is now’ and ‘obviously the afterlife counts as lived experience’ and ‘who’s being pedantic now, Eliot?’ 

Which is fine, to each their own eternity. Sure, maybe the bedraggled-academic-meets-damaged-creative aesthetic isn’t _quite_ what Eliot imagined it would be— less ‘let’s split a breakfast muffin over coffee against an exposed brick backdrop, while you read and I stare pensively out the window,’ and more ‘feel free to camp out in the living room and we’ll not speak for three days straight,’— but that’s fine. The afterlife can’t give him everything. 

Besides, it’s… nice. Kind of.

It really was frankly criminal, for a nice padded window seat like that to go unused and gathering dust. And Quentin doesn’t always come over, but the days that he does he spends curled up there like a rabbit in a burrow, surrounded by books, soaking up sunlight and chewing straight through his pens and his hair and whatever new baking experiment Eliot feels like churning through that day.

This time, they’re shortbread cookies he made to go with his coffee. 

“Cross-eyed yet?” he asks, when he brings the leftovers around.

Quentin grunts, and Eliot climbs up into the space beside him. Quentin likes to curl, limbs all tucked up and twisted around each other, and Eliot likes to sprawl, knees and elbows slotting into empty space. It makes for a very satisfying fit. 

“Well, let me know,” he goes on, offering the plate. Quentin’s free hand snakes out to slide a cookie from the edge. “Fair warning, you’ve been obligated to take at least one break later. Extended. I’m throwing an impromptu little something tonight.”

“Why?” Quentin asks, without even looking up from his notebook.

“I don’t understand the question.”

“I mean, like.” Quentin’s brow furrows, struggling to balance his split attention between writing and speaking at the same time. He must not make it all the way, because the scale tips: his pen keeps moving, and then he just says, again, “Why?”

It's no fun when he refuses to even play the game. “I don’t know,” Eliot sighs, tilting the crown of his head back against the window. “Bored, I guess.”

That _does_ get Quentin to look up from his notebook. 

“Bored.” He fully gapes, jaw hanging open. “You— what? You’re _bored?_ ”

Jesus. Eliot really does not have the inclination to go down this road today, especially not when he knows exactly where it dead-ends out. 

“How are you not?” he asks, reaching up to pointedly rub at both temples. “I’m getting bored just looking at you.”

It’s not true. But whoever said you had to tell the truth to get what you want?

Anyway, it doesn’t work. Quentin sits up straighter and pushes his hair back behind his ears with both hands, which is the closest thing to a power stance he has in his repertoire, so. This is gonna end up being a whole thing.

“Uh, Janet?” Quentin calls. He always raises his voice a little, like Janet’s just hanging out in the next room, instead of existing on an interdimensional plane outside their mortal comprehension. “Hey, Janet?”

She appears before he’s done asking the second time, in front of and between them. One blink: empty living room, next blink: Janet. “Hi there!” she says, like always. Still smiling, like always. “How can I help?”

“Hi,” Quentin answers, his whole face softening into a returning half-smile. Then he jabs his heel into the vulnerable space below Eliot’s ribs. “Look,” he tells him, “just— look. There’s so much possibility just, right here. Like, uh- uh—” 

He snaps his fingers. “Oh! Okay, so, Janet." He closes his book in his lap and clears his throat, like he needs to demonstrate proper etiquette on how to ask a question. "Was there really, um, a city called Atlantis, that sank into the sea?”

“Yes," Janet says.

That was, evidently, not actually the answer Quentin expected. He’s not prepared at all to hear it. He’d been ready to keep talking, launch into part two of whatever sparkling lecture Eliot’s sure he had queued up to go, but the syllable hits him like a taser; he jerks, and then he freezes, paralyzed.

Eliot sets the plate of cookies in his lap and leans back into the crook of the window to watch.

“Holy crap,” Quentin says, hushed. Devotional, even. “What, uh— _what?_ ” 

“There really was a city called Atlantis that sank into the sea,” Janet repeats, ever the professional.

Quentin is literally breathless with excitement. He leans forward, hands around his ankles, notebook forgotten. “Wow,” he manages, and Eliot assumes he's been forgotten, too. “Uh, wow. Okay. How do I— Where do I even start? Um, is it- is it like a ruin now, or does it still, like, function? As a society?”

“Oh, it’s a fully functioning society,” she says, and Quentin shoots Eliot a wild, wide-eyed look, like they embarked down this wacky line of questioning by mutual consent, instead of Quentin muscling his way into the driver’s seat and dropping a cinderblock on the gas pedal.

(Eliot doesn’t give a flying fuck about Atlantis, but he raises his eyebrows high in return anyway, spreads his smile wide anyway, because this conversation _is_ the best thing that’s happened to him in ages. They’re definitely on the same page about that.)

“There are ruins left over from the cataclysmic event that sank the city,” Janet is explaining, and Quentin hangs on her every word, rapt. His _mouth is hanging open,_ for the love of christ, “but the modern culture has built itself around them, as a way to both honor their history and learn from it. Like Rome. Or shopping malls!”

“Right, of course,” Quentin says. Of course, of course. “And so, the- the— preservation, I guess? Is that the right word for it?”

“No,” Janet says helpfully. “The right word is _adaptation._ ”

Quentin nods. “Yeah, the adaptation,” he agrees. “Is that— technology? Or is it just, y’know, rapid evolution? Or...” He hovers, elated, on the edge of his question, not quite able to get it out. His tongue darts out to wet his lips. 

Eliot snaps through a cookie with his canines.

“They use a combination of different solutions,” Janet says. “Innovation is very strong there.”

“Yeah,” Quentin breathes. “I mean, obviously, it’d have to be, right? Like, I can imagine. Or, maybe I can’t, but...” 

He stalls out again. It seems to Eliot like he’s got too many excitable wires crossing in his brain, like he keeps trying to grab onto one to follow but ends up getting tangled in all the others halfway along. Quentin hunches, his mouth pressing thin and his brow furrowing hard.

“Have a cookie, Q,” Eliot tells him, offering the plate again. “Give the lady a chance to catch her breath.”

“That’s okay,” Janet says brightly. “I don’t need to breathe. Also, I’m not a lady.”

Eliot really does like her so much. “Noted.”

Quentin is giving him a weird look, but he does take the cookie. He settles, leaning back into his own space to nibble on it. “C’mon,” he says to Eliot. “This is what I’m talking about. There’s so much out there we don’t know, that- that we _couldn’t_ know, when we were alive.” He takes a small breath, and heaves a big exhale. “Just— ask something. Anything.”

Janet twists her shoulders to focus all of her intense, earnest attention onto Eliot. And, look, he really would’ve preferred to skim past this if they could. He would’ve been fine sitting here, eating his weight in shortbread and watching Quentin get progressively more worked up about, like, the Atlantian solution for waste disposal, or something.

But Quentin can’t just let go of anything. Eliot should know that by now.

He examines the last bite of his cookie. It’s heavier than he would’ve liked; he needs to reevaluate his recipe. “Nah,” he says. “I’m good.”

“Okay!” Janet says, and diverts her attention back to Quentin. “Can I help with anything else?”

“Um,” Quentin says, and then he sighs, like he’s disappointed. Eliot’s proud of the way he weathers his own sudden rush of annoyance without rolling his eyes. “No, that’s okay. We’re, um, good. Thanks.”

“Okay!” she says again, and then she disappears.

Exit now unobstructed, Eliot pushes himself off the edge of the window seat. He picks up the plate, still with one last stray cookie in the center, and starts dusting any crumbs he can find off into it. 

Quentin is watching him. He can feel it, that bowling ball weight set right on top of his chest. He braces himself for the impassioned little nerd rant that has to be at the end of this extensive a wind-up, about— he doesn’t know. He’s not actually sure what it is about this that’s got Quentin all keyed up in the first place. The freedom of knowledge, or the morality of curiosity, or something. 

“Really?” Quentin asks. “The whole- whole universe, and you don’t have any questions? About anything?”

"We can’t all be scholars, Q," Eliot answers. "And my soul is resting very comfortably as-is, thanks."

There is _something._ Eliot can usually feel that, too, when Quentin’s got all these brimming, percolating feelings that he’s trying to distill out into consecutive words and sentences. The more intense it is, the longer it takes; if nothing else, Eliot can always count on the suspense.

In the end, though, all Quentin winds up saying is: “Are you going to keep calling me that?” 

And if he’s ready to move on from this, great. Eliot is too.

“I’m experimenting with nicknames,” he says. “Q. Like your apartment.” He’d assumed that reference had been obvious, but Quentin’s mouth rounds out like it’s just now occurring to him. “Not a fan?”

“No,” Quentin says, then balks. “I mean, it’s not— It’s fine. I don’t mind.” 

“Because I have other options, if you want to hear them.”

“No,” Quentin says again, but fuller this time, like there’s laughter underneath it. “Q is fine. I mean, it’s good.” He’s looking at his hands, watching himself flick the clip of his pen with his thumb. “Other people would call me that, sometimes. At— um. Before.”

“Sounds like I’m a natural, then.” Eliot picks up the last cookie from the plate, and holds out the round edge of it. “Here. Splitsies.”

Quentin gives him a flat, incredulous smile, but he plays along. He reaches up to grasp the other side between his thumb and forefinger, they both twist their wrists— and the cookie snaps in two. Eliot even has the presence of mind to hover the plate beneath their hands, to catch the shower of shortbread crumbs.

It’s not an even split, but when is it ever? Eliot’s half carves into Quentin’s at the top and caves in towards the middle, like an emaciated crescent moon. It’s pretty obviously smaller, but that’s fine. Eliot’s fine to take it, because he’s not a child.

“Uh, crap,” Quentin says, before he can, “hang on, I got it,” and then he snaps off the round belly of his own half so that it leaves a straight, flat, more proportional edge. He offers up the extra piece. “Here.”

“Magnanimous of you,” Eliot says. 

Q shrugs, still half-smiling, self-conscious but all-in, and Eliot feels— insane. Again. Constantly. Maybe this isn’t the afterlife at all, he thinks; maybe it’s just the last colorful sputters of his brain finally giving out from all the fucking drugs.

He takes it. 

  


* * *

  


“Why don’t you get Janet to do all this for you?” Q asks him, when the oven goes off.

He abandoned his books once the sun finally shifted out of the window, and once the prospect of more snacks became a tantalizing reality. He’s since made himself very comfortable, sitting backwards in one of Eliot’s dining room chairs, elbow deep in a fiesta-size bag of tortilla chips that Eliot did _not_ provide. So little faith, and yet he still stretches his neck to try and get a peek at Eliot’s baking sheet over the lip of the island.

“Where do you think all the ingredients came from?” Eliot returns.

“No, I mean.” Quentin points, still chewing. “Why even ask for the ingredients at all? No offense, but she could probably get this all set up way faster than you could.”

Eliot gives the whole pan one final hit of sea salt. “Offense taken—” He fishes a lovely, geometric serving bowl out of the cupboard beside the sink. “—processed—” Scoops half of this first batch into it. “—and retained, thank you.”

Q snorts, and snaps off another chip between his teeth. Eliot comes around the counter to snatch the bag away from him.

“Uh, excuse you,” he says, brow furrowed, but his hands are perfectly content to accept the bowl as a replacement. They’re baked naan wedges, better in every single conceivable way, even if Q keeps insisting on eating them plain, like a barbarian.

“Excuse _you._ ” Eliot kicks open the trashcan and drops the bag inside, where it promptly dissolves out of existence. “My eternal resting place, my rules.”

He expects another rejoinder while his back is turned. Something to the tune of _That wasn’t what you said when you threw out all my instant ramen,_ maybe, or: _I have a lot of detailed thoughts about different theories of autonomy, Eliot._

Instead, Quentin is quiet, and then he says, “Can I help, at least?”

And, well. There’s plenty to do, because there always is. Eliot generally prefers knowing that everything’s correct because he’s done it himself, sure, but he doesn’t— _not_ trust Quentin.

“Up,” he says, before he can think better of it. Q nearly tips the entire chair over trying to unfold his legs out from under him, so it’s already worth it. “I’m starting on drinks next. We need coupe glasses, five to a tray.”

Quentin doesn’t know what a coupe glass is. “I was thinking something a little easier,” he grumbles, after his second misinterpretation of 'wide rim, round bottom'. He’s arranging them in neat, precise pentagons on the trays, which is patently ridiculous and basically guaranteed to spill, but he’s— helping. And Eliot is very grateful. “Like, streamer duty or something.”

“The sacrifices we make for knowledge,” Eliot sighs dreamily. He wraps one arm around Quentin’s shoulders, tilts his temple against the crown of Quentin’s head. “Do not,” he murmurs, “for the rest of our shared eternity, ever suggest that I’m the sort of person who indulges in _streamers_ again.” 

Q elbows him in the ribs, and goes right back to failing to account for gravity and weight distribution.

“I guess I’m just surprised,” he says, when the glasses are set and all that’s left is to watch Eliot make his magic. “I mean, I know why _I_ like this sort of thing. But…”

He doesn’t finish the thought, but he frowns a bit, like he meant to but couldn’t string it together in time. It’s fine; Eliot knows the broad strokes already— Eliot doesn’t seem the type, lazy and hedonistic and mercurial as he is, to care much about how details fit together. 

“The challenge is part of the draw, Q,” he explains, measuring out ounces of light rum. “The most I’ve ever had to work with at one time was half a dingy warehouse in Bushwick, so.”

Quentin’s eyebrows go up, and ah, _shit._ Right. Columbia. “You were in New York?”

It’s— a complicated question to answer honestly. But maybe that’s just because Eliot’s never bothered to answer it honestly before. He’s not sure why it even occurs to him to try now, except that, well… maybe it feels particularly sleazy to still be lying in this Heaven-Not-Heaven in-between afterlife. Especially about something that literally cannot even begin to matter anymore, because he’s fucking dead.

He shrugs. “I was rotating opportunities after undergrad,” he hedges, which is technically not a lie either, so. Character growth. “I was lots of places.”

“Right.” Quentin frowns down at the tray of glasses in front of him. “It’s just— It’s kinda weird. Don’t you think? I mean, most of the people I’ve met so far have been from all over the country. The- The world, basically. You’re the first one who was, like, a borough over.”

He’s making a lot of assumptions. People always do.

“It’s a big town,” Eliot answers.

“Yeah.” Quentin shakes his head, like he’s shaking off the thought. “No, I know. You’re right.” He smiles, quick and dim. “It’s nice to have somebody to back me up on the great public transportation debate, at least, I guess.”

He picks at the glasses, twisting them this way and that until the detailing on their bases line up in a messy approximation of a star. He’s doing that thing he does sometimes, where it’s like his body’s on autopilot; he’s still moving, but his eyes are flat and hazy.

“Get a highball down,” Eliot says, rinsing out his cocktail shaker. Quentin blinks at him, then at the shelf of glasses again, and he remembers to add, “One of the tall, skinny ones.”

He does, with only a brief (if distressing) detour towards the pint glasses. 

And— Eliot is doing this, apparently. _Not ready_ would be a profoundly gentle term for what he’s about to turn out onto this bar, but fortune supposedly favors the bold, so long as you’re only counting winners and not, for example, premature deaths. He needs the Nolet’s, and champagne, and— 

Q watches, while Eliot measures and mixes. There’s a flicker in his eyes now, at least, of something like curiosity. “What’s that?”

“New recipe I’ve been working on.” Eliot strains it out into the glass. The color still isn’t _quite_ where he’d like it to be, but... whatever. They’re in beta still. He has time to work through the details. 

“I’m thinking about making it my signature,” he says, deftly curling his lemon twist along the lip of the glass. He sets it out on the bartop between them. “Unfiltered opinions only, please.”

Quentin splays his hands out on either side of the glass. He bends to sniff at it, like he’s a judge at a dog show examining a poodle’s ass, instead of the practiced sommelier Eliot’s sure he imagines he is. But it’s— something, it’s something other than the gray, flattening shroud, so Eliot bites his tongue.

“You sure you’re ready for my unfiltered opinions?” Q says, Eliot having apparently passed the poodle sniff test. He lifts his chin, the lines of his face very serious. 

(He thinks it makes him look tough and defiant. Eliot thinks it’s unbearably cute.)

“I’m sure no one could be,” Eliot says. “But I’ll do my best.”

“Okay,” Q says, prim. He scoops up the glass, brings it to his lips, gives Eliot a pointed look around the lemon twist— and takes a sip.

He frowns.

And then he doesn’t say anything.

“Take your time,” Eliot says, after a moment or two. “I have a famously robust ego.”

Quentin shakes his head, whatever that’s supposed to mean. He sniffs the glass again, and then sips again, and keeps frowning.

“This tastes familiar,” he says, finally. He lifts his head, and turns his frown on Eliot. “Where have I had this before?”

“Well,” Eliot says, “it’s a bit niche, but you may have heard of a type of sparkling wine known as _champagne_.”

“Ha ha.” He takes another sip, and Eliot watches him roll this one around in his mouth before swallowing. “I’m serious. I mean, yeah, the champagne is kinda, uh, smothering it—”

“ _Smothering?_ ” 

“—but there’s something else, too.”

“It’s the gin you like,” Eliot tells him. “Can we circle back around to our word choice here, please?”

Quentin sips again, and then he bobs his head, pointing at Eliot like they’re playing charades. “Yeah, yeah. The, uh, kinda fruity one. Like peaches.” He clears his throat, equivocating. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. This is— It’s good.”

“Glowing, Q.”

Quentin manages a little smile. “It is,” he says. “It’s just… um.” He exhales harshly, furrowing down at the glass again. “How do I explain it? I liked the gin because it was— kind of weird, you know? Like, before I was just like… it’s the one that tastes like christmas trees. Right?”

Eliot has no idea where he’s going with this. “Right.”

“Just— stay with me. So, like, this is good, right?” Quentin lifts the glass in a lame little cheers. “But it’s trying to be subtle, so it kinda loses out on what’s interesting about the, um, individual components. Does that make sense?”

“Oh,” Eliot says, struck once by the analysis and again by the fact that he’s pretty sure Quentin Coldwater just called him _basic._ “That’s actually good feedback.”

He expects— he’s not sure what he expects. But Q brightens, unexpectedly pleased. “Yeah?” He passes the glass over, when Eliot holds his hand out for it. “Because I was thinking, um, it would be easy to go too far in the other direction, where it’s, like, basically one of those fancy brunch mimosas, but…”

“Bellini,” Eliot fills in for him, taking a sip of his own. He tastes it, now. The ratios aren’t bad— they’re _excellent,_ thank you very much— but he can run the simulations in his head, for if he leaned into the flavor instead of accenting it. He twists around, scanning the rows of his liquor shelf.

“Right, yeah,” Quentin says. “Which, maybe that wouldn’t be the worst thing.”

“I’m not making a bellini, Quentin,” Eliot says. “No mistake: they’re delicious. But we’re on a higher plane than that.” He thrusts a bottle of peach nectar behind him. “Hold this.”

“Oh,” Quentin says. He takes it, though, cradling it into the cup of his elbow. “We’re, uh, doing this now? Don’t we still need to finish…?”

“The creative process waits for no man,” Eliot tells him. “Besides, tonight is my version of a relaxing night in.” He plucks down the domaine de canton, presses that against Quentin’s chest too, and smiles bright. “We’ll be fine.”

  


* * *

  


So his impromptu little something maybe ends up getting a smidge out of hand.

In his defense, he really did intend for ‘impromptu’, ‘little’, and ‘something’ to all be accurate descriptors. But word spreads fast in a neighborhood of three-fifty-plus very bored, very lost souls, and he’s— made an impression, he guesses. This is the first time he’s had a turnout quite this large, but there has to be a first one sometime, doesn’t there?

And he’s pleased about that. He is. It’s a symbol of his hard work coming to fruition. The name _Eliot Waugh_ becoming synonymous with _A Good Fucking Time,_ like it was always meant to be.

It’s just... You know. In this _particular_ instance, it’s— 

“Remember when you promised me this would be relaxing?” Quentin says mildly.

— not exactly what he was going for.

“I never promise anything,” Eliot answers. “And technically I said it would be relaxing for _me._ ”

He’s had to stake claim on his own fucking furniture, there’s so many people in his house right now. He’s let Quentin have the corner of the couch, where he can use the arm and Eliot’s body as bulwarks from the rest of the room. He’s sitting cross-legged, which was the most space Eliot could convince him to take up at one time, while Eliot himself has gone full manspreading nightmare: knees wide, arms splayed, to discourage any third party perchers.

(It only half works. There’s some girl sitting on the other arm of the couch, swaying and laughing loudly, with her arms around some other girl’s waist. He’s glad they’re enjoying themselves, but it’s also annoying as fuck.)

“You know you don’t have to, like, babysit me,” Quentin says. “This might, uh, come as a shock, but I actually had some experience going to parties before I met you.”

“You?” Eliot echoes thoughtfully. He squints. Boxes his hands to frame Q’s face. “Mm. Nope. Can’t see it.”

“Hilarious,” Quentin says, but there’s a thin quality to it. “Real creative.”

Eliot settles back down, tossing his arm into the empty space of the couch to scare off another circling seat vulture. “Don’t fret,” he says. “You’re fine. It’s not really my speed tonight, the—” He flicks his hand out towards the dance floor in the center of the room, where Mi-jin and Jess are apparently on again, grinding so hard it might be better termed 'scissoring standing up'. “But what kind of shepherd would I be if I didn’t let my charges follow their bliss?”

“Uh, a good one? I think ‘don’t let them wander wherever they want’ is literally the first rule of being a shepherd.”

Eliot drops his head back against the cushions and sighs, content. “No one likes a know-it-all, Q.”

“Uh-huh.” Quentin smiles at him like a flicker. “Well, then, um.” He leverages himself up with his elbow on the back of the couch, so he can scoot forward a bit, and then lets his arm fall back down across the cushions. His wrist lands just behind Eliot’s shoulder. “If you want, we could go grab a smoke? Or just, like, get some air? Or something?”

God, the places Eliot could go with a greenfield like _or something._

He rolls his head to the side to get a better look. Q is watching him carefully, with all his weighty attention, and he flashes that flickery smile again when their eyes meet. He’s trying to be relaxed, but it’s not really working; there’s a determined little set to his mouth, and his hand on the back of the couch keeps twitching where his thumb is half-tangled up in a curl of Eliot’s hair.

And it’s— weird. It is. No getting around that. Eliot doesn’t usually do the friends thing, that’s true, but he’s been around the block enough times and seen enough made-for-TV movies to know that a proper _with benefits_ upgrade takes real finesse to manage well. He would, for example, be elated to fuck Q right here, press him down into the cushions and let the whole neighborhood watch, but he wouldn’t— he doesn’t— 

He’s not sure how he’d feel, if Q couldn’t look him in the eye tomorrow.

So: finesse. He can do that. 

He tilts his head back a little more, to let his hair spill out across the rest of Q’s knuckles. “Okay,” he says.

Q’s whole face goes slack. “Oh,” he says, “yeah?” with his mouth round and surprised, like he didn’t expect to get this far. 

“Mm. I’m dry, though,” Eliot says, tapping his thumb against the rim of his glass. Q’s eyes dart down to it, and then back up again. “Go on ahead, I’ll meet you out there.”

“Uh, yeah,” Q says, still blinking back shock. He’s cute. “Okay. I’ll just— I’ll be out front?” 

“Sounds good,” Eliot says.

Q smiles, then. Sudden, bright, so much more than a flicker. He uses Eliot’s knee for leverage when he stands up, wholly unnecessary and electrically promising. “Oh, uh.” He waggles his empty glass, half-melted ice rattling. “Could you bring me a whiskey ginger, too? While you’re over there? I mean, if you’ve got the hands.”

Eliot straightens up too, smoothing down the creases in his shirtsleeves. He bends close to Q’s ear— to talk over all the noise, of course— and promises, “I’m excellent with my hands.”

He waits just long enough to appreciate the shaky exhale against his cheek, and then he sets his sights on the bar.

Long story short: it’s a bad plan.

Which, maybe that’s obvious, but he’s distracted. He thinks he should get a pass. _He_ might be doing the careful, precise, restrained thing, but he’s never believed in putting handicaps on his imagination, so: he’s crossing the room, thinking about making Q a drink and then plucking it out of his hand later. He’s putting ice in twin glasses, and thinking about setting it down behind him on the veranda’s balustrade. He’s picking out liquor, and thinking about crowding Q back against the side of the house. He’s pouring fingers of bourbon, and thinking about tasting it on Q’s tongue. 

— Anyway. 

The point is, he doesn’t take certain key factors into account. For instance: the time it takes for him to make both his own gin and tonic and Q’s whiskey ginger; the distance from the couch to the front door, which he’s now left Q to cross unaccompanied; and, perhaps most importantly, the wildcard that is Sascha Bykov and his unending, unrelenting, uncompromising friendliness.

In other words: by the time Eliot turns around, Quentin has already been intercepted.

Sascha caught him trying to hug the wall to get around the crowd. He’s got both big hands on Quentin’s shoulders, bent nearly in half to talk to him. (Over the noise. Of course.) Quentin is nodding and smiling, nodding and smiling, but his eyes keep scanning out across the room.

They catch on Eliot as he approaches. Quentin tilts his head to the side, self-deprecating amusement splashing out across his face; Sascha turns to see what he’s looking at— and his breakout smile breaks out even further. 

“Eliot!” he booms, delighted. He shifts to throw one arm across Quentin’s shoulders, and motions Eliot closer with the other.

Eliot allows himself to be drawn into the whirlpool, if only for the solidarity; Sascha gets his free arm around Eliot’s neck, and then squeezes them both in so tight it pops along Eliot’s spine between his shoulderblades.

“Sascha…” he says, catching Q’s eye across the broad wasteland of Sascha’s barrel chest. “Hi.”

Q tilts wry resignation back at him. He mouths, ‘Thanks,’ when Eliot passes him his whiskey ginger, and then says, “Oh, yeah. It’s, like, crazy in here,” in response to Sascha’s exultations of Eliot’s social prowess, or whatever.

So. 

So much for that.

  


* * *

  


The mood ebbs in the other direction.

Disappointing? Sure. But he’s survived worse than blue balls, and it’s not like he’s pressed for time, in this sprawling eternity they’re all stuck in together. In the interim, Eliot does his best to rally himself onboard with the rest of the party’s wild, frenetic energy. It’s an accomplishment, all of this. He should be in the right headspace to appreciate that.

Then the front door slams open, and the whole room stills.

For a brief, disorienting second he thinks Sascha must have arrived— except Sascha is here, obviously. He’s standing right here, with him and Q, belly-deep in some story that cruised straight past the two-minute courtesy mark ages ago.

It’s a similar effect, though: that ripple of recognition, the split-second hush. Only it’s heavier this time, more wound with tension, like that old urban legend about the visceral moment of silence for Abraham Lincoln experienced only by true American patriots, or however the fuck it goes. Two parts awe, one part bone-deep respect, all held together by a hearty fear of stepping out of line.

Eliot finds himself turning to look, with everyone else.

She’s got to be five foot nothing, on heels like those: glossy black, six-inch spike stilettos. _Small_ isn’t the right word, though. It is actively the wrong fucking word; Eliot’s sure he could fit her under his chin if he tried, and he’s also sure he’d come out the other side missing a testicle if he did. The two girls that come in behind her— dressed just like her, but worse— are both taller than her even with the heels, and it makes no impact whatsoever. Eliot’s still looking at them and he’s already forgotten what they look like.

She stops in his foyer with her hands on her hips, and cuts a long, evaluative glance out across the party. She has the audacity to look _bored,_ eyes drifting across the foyer to the bar to the living room, one hand poised at her chin like she’s waiting to yawn into it. 

Her gaze passes over Quentin, climbs up Sascha’s big frame, slides back down— and then snaps to Eliot’s.

Her eyebrows lift. Her fingers curl in toward her throat. She dips her head to one side, long dark hair spilling over her bare shoulders, and smirks.

What the fuck.

It barely lasts half a breath. She looks away, tilts her jaw at the girls flanking her, and it’s like the whole world rushes back in around him: music and noise and sweat-stale air.

What the _fuck._

Sascha is talking about— something. Eliot forgot. He’s into… mountain climbing? Maybe it’s that. But he’s into a lot of things, honestly, so it could be anything. Quentin seems focused, at least, wearing a tick between his eyebrows and a thoughtful frown like the determined little academic he is.

She’s carving a path through the crowd now, making her way to his unmanned bar. She’s wearing a cropped burgundy tube top and a glittering gold mini-skirt, and walks like she’s thinking about murder.

“Hold that thought,” Eliot says, the next time Sascha takes a breath. He curls one hand around the edge of Quentin’s elbow, and claps the other high on Sascha’s broad shoulderblade. “Gentlemen.”

Sascha raises his glass in a cheerful toast goodbye. Q throws him a quick, exasperated look, so they were definitely talking about mountain climbing, or at least well on their way to it. All the more reason for Eliot to bail, so he throws a wink back and dips out across the living room.

She’s waiting for him. She’s not even trying to pretend otherwise, leaning back against the bar with her elbows propped behind her. Her squad has scattered, and the bar itself is suspiciously deserted; it’s her, and him, and a shitload of excellent alcohol.

“Hi,” she says. Her eyes do a clean sweep: up to the top of his head, down to his feet, and back up again. “You’re him, huh?”

“Eliot,” he answers. “I don’t think we’ve met.”

She smiles at him; not sweetly, and not smirking, but with fascinated, predatory curiosity, the way he’s seen cats look at birds flying past a window. “No,” she says, “we haven’t.”

It’s that sort of game they’re playing, then. Fine.

Her smile follows him as he circles around to the back of the bar. “So,” she says, resting her forearms on the bar and her tits on her forearms. “What’s a girl gotta do to get a drink around here?”

He draws himself up, so that he can peer down the end of his nose at her. He purses his lips like he’s thinking about it, palming his cocktail shaker in one hand.

“Name it,” he allows.

Her eyes snap up to the liquor shelf behind him. She draws her thumb across her full lower lip, scanning. “Paloma,” she decides. It’s not a terrible choice. “Fresh grapefruit juice. Reposado. Salt on the rim.”

She watches him make it. She gives him little bits of color commentary that he ignores: things like a rolling, “Mm _hm,_ ” while he juices grapefruit and limes, a simpering, “Correct,” when he picks tequila from the shelf, and a simple, “Huh,” when he strains it out into the glass.

He sets the drink in front of her, cuts a slice into a grapefruit wedge, and presses it onto the rim. Finished.

“Hm.” She tilts her head to one side, like she’s watching a dog do a trick. “Cute.”

“Problem?” he says.

She flutters her eyelashes up at him. “Oh, no.” She reaches out for the drink, fingers wrapping precisely and coquettishly around the width of the glass. “This actually looks pretty good.” She plucks the slice of grapefruit from the rim and studies it. “Points for style, sure.”

Then she presses it between her lips, and sucks it dry. 

“It’s just cute, you know,” she says when she’s finished. She’s smiling at him again, that same sharp-edged flash of teeth, as she lets the rind fall back to the bartop. Bitch. “Your whole schtick.”

At the edge of his periphery, he sees Quentin turn his head.

“And what’s that?” he asks, and her smile gets bigger. “My quote-unquote _schtick._ ”

“ _You_ know.” She lifts the glass to her lips, tongue lapping out to scoop salt into her swallow. “The handmade drinks, the homemade food, the—” she wrinkles her nose at the ceiling, “I’m guessing _personal_ playlist. You’re embracing the imperfections of humanity.” She bats her eyes again. He keeps looking for the telltale line of a false lash and keeps coming up empty. “It’s cute. Cozy. Homey, even.”

Fucking _bitch._

“Someone else might be content with whatever the conveyor line puts out,” he says, dropping his eyes down the whole, sleek frame of her. He lingers on the thought long enough to meet her eye again, and to see the flash of insult there. He smiles, too. “I prefer to give the people what they _actually_ want.”

Behind her head, he sees Sascha in the middle of the crowd. He’s got his arms around Jess and Mi-jin now, squeezing them both in tight, bellowing his big belly laugh.

Shit.

Eliot lets himself steal a glance to the side, and— _shit._

Quentin is shouldering his way toward them. 

It’s only half a second, but she can tell that his attention is wandering. He knows that as soon as he pulls his gaze back down to her, and finds her up on her elbows, eyebrows high in mocking curiosity. But she doesn’t turn around or look over her shoulder; she opts to wait instead, swirling her drink and sipping it delicately. 

“Interesting take,” she says conversationally. “Wonder if it’s really all it’s cracked up to be.”

Quentin pops out of the crowd behind her, with all the grace he’s never had. He keeps trying to catch Eliot’s eye— in between smoothing his hair back and picking at his shirt where it’s been rucked up in the back— and frowning deeper and deeper the longer he doesn’t get it.

Eventually, he gives up. He crosses his arms, and leans forward to try and get her attention instead. “Uh, hi?” he says, with a bright edge of latent bitchiness.

He’s sweet. But out of his depth. 

New Bitch on the Block ignores him completely.

“Anyway.” She turns her back on Eliot with a flick of her hair over her shoulder, and leaves her still half-full glass on the bar. “This party doesn’t _totally_ suck. Maybe I’ll stick around for a bit. See what else you’ve got to offer.”

She scans the room again, with that same bored, detached gaze— and then she looks at Quentin, finally, like she just noticed he was there. 

He startles under the sudden attention, and then he tries to double-down on whatever stern entry-level TA thing he’s got going on. But his arms are already folded, so all he can do is puff up, kind of, like one of those little birds that try to look slightly less little when they’re terrified.

(It’s blood in the water. Eliot knows, because he and Queen Bitch are cut to the exact same couture specifications.)

She takes a step forward, and Eliot watches Quentin very visibly stop himself from taking a step back. He squeezes his arms tighter over his chest, and then— _oh, honey, no_ — cuts a panicked glance up at Eliot over her shoulder.

Eliot shakes his head once, sharply. Quentin sets his jaw and drops his eyes, doing his best to meet her stare; it's an attempt that's endearing in its earnest effort, even if he was doomed before he started.

She’s tilting her head, looking him over. It’s another one of those sweeping head-to-toe glances, but this time it’s more performative, so that he can watch her looking. It works on Quentin, because of course it does; even in this lighting, Eliot can see the redness creeping up the back of his neck.

“I’m Margo,” she tells him sweetly, like a decision. She gives him doe eyes over a shark smile, and reaches out to adjust his collar with one hand. Her thumb lingers against the side of his neck. “Bye.”

Her eyes dart back up to Eliot, and then she’s striking out across the room again, nothing but rolling hips and long, swaying hair.

Quentin looks at him. "What the crap was that?" he says.

“Nothing,” Eliot answers.

“Who’s she?”

“No one.” Eliot wipes his hands on a clean dishtowel and throws it back onto the bar. “We're going to destroy her. Come with me.”

“Uh," Quentin says, "what?”

Eliot gets him by the arm, and drags him back in towards the crowd. “ _Come_ with _me._ ”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew! Remember me? Noted: I am not one of the people whose creativity flourished under quarantine.
> 
> Anyway, we're back. The world's a mess, but I hope you're all doing alright, and I want to thank everyone for all the kudos, nice comments, and everything while I got my act together. Hopefully this story can provide some distraction, even if it's only for a little bit!
> 
> Some housekeeping: I've given up on fitting this story into my initial chapter projections and am just letting the outline call the shots from here on out, hence the upped chapter count. Nothing about the story has changed, it's all structural (shorter but, ideally, more frequent chapters). The final count will probably stay elastic for a while yet, but wanted to still give y'all an idea of where we're at.

Quentin spends the night.

… asterisk: on the couch. 

Eliot’s almost surprised to find him still there when he comes downstairs the next morning. Not that he thinks Quentin is the type to slip out before dawn— he thinks Quentin is the type to accidentally trap himself into brunch the next morning— just that Eliot has a whole host of choppy, dehydrated memories from last night’s late-night-early-morning sleep deprivation zone, and he wasn’t sure how many of them were real and how many were excerpts from an intriguing-but-off-brand dream he had.

Anyway, Quentin sleeping over was apparently real, and so is the disaster state he’s left Eliot’s couch in. His body must forget all the scrunching and curling rules once his brain turns off, because all of Eliot’s decorative throw pillows have been kicked or swiped or otherwise flung to the floor— excepting, of course, the one Quentin currently has clutched to his face. He’s twisted up in the blanket so much it makes having a blanket functionally pointless, wound around his waist and stuffed beneath his shoulders. He’s shoved the bottom cushions partially out, half-sunk as he is into the back crease of the couch. He’s snoring, very, very, _very_ quietly.

Eliot puts the coffee on.

It’s not bad, for a morning after. Very calm, very gentle, very aesthetic. That fresh-brewed, marketing-grade coffee smell spills rich and warm from the kitchen, seeps its way into the dining room, into the living room, into all the nooks and crannies and architectural oddities of the house. Early sunlight peeks through the slats of the blinds. Birds sit and sing in the trees outside. If Saturdays were still a thing that held any meaning at all, this would be a flawless example of one.

… That said, it’s also very _slow._ And yes, Q’s sleepy morning is sweet and peaceful, a special, secret glimpse into a fragile moment of human vulnerability, yadda yadda, et cetera et cetera, but Eliot’s sort of on a clock here, so.

He goes into the living room and opens up all the blinds, all at once.

Q gets a sunbeam right in the eye, which Eliot didn’t actually intend but is effective at getting him what he wants, so he’s willing to shoulder the blame for it. Q groans, and his body snaps together like a rubber band, hands into his face and elbows into his ribs and knees into his chest, like his brain re-engaged all his wind-up protocols as soon as it came back online. 

“Oh,” Eliot says. “Are you up?”

Quentin rolls over, scrubbing at his eyes. The decorative ruching of the pillow has left a stamp on one side of his face. “What the _fork,_ Eliot.”

“Use that kind of language in this house again and you’re banned for eternity,” Eliot tells him. “How do you like your eggs?”

“What?” Quentin says, sighs, _whines,_ like Eliot isn’t very clearly and generously offering to make him breakfast. “I don’t know. Scrambled? How many different ways can there be to make eggs?”

Just for that, Eliot draws the whole thing out. He makes eggs benedict for them both: fluffy english muffins, savory Canadian bacon, tangy-rich hollandaise. He swirls the water while poaching the eggs instead of using a sieve, for the added flair of it. 

(He’s sure Q would have been very impressed, had he gotten bored or curious or apologetic and wandered into the kitchen to observe. Q doesn’t do that, but _if_ he had.)

When he he brings the plates back into the living room, Quentin has evolved to sitting up. He’s got the pocket notebook he carries around with him open in his lap, and he doesn’t have a pen, but he is squinting at it, thumb pressed to the spine and bottom lip drawn between his teeth. He hasn’t bothered to unwind the blanket, and his hair is a wild mess: all rucked up in the back and flopped messily over his part in the front. 

Eliot thinks about getting his hands in it. Letting it loop around his fingers, letting bedhead tangles give him some resistance when he pulls, tipping Quentin’s head back and baring the stubbled line of his throat— 

Jesus. Focus. _Finesse._

Eliot taps into his inner starving-artist-slash-black-tie-waiter, and presents the plate down on one flat palm. “Breakfast is served,” he says, “my so-called friend.”

Quentin lifts his hand to let his notebook fall shut, and ends up combing self-consciously back through his hair in the same motion. “Jesus,” he says, while also still taking the plate. “I said scrambled. Did you just, like, make this?”

“You’re welcome,” Eliot says. He leaves his own plate on the end table to wait while he makes another trip for coffee.

“I mean, yeah, thank you,” Quentin says, automatic. The tines of his fork whine against his plate, because he’s scraping up his bites, because it’s a _fantastic_ hollandaise. “It’s still overkill.” 

“The torch has been lit, Q,” Eliot answers over his shoulder, and Quentin’s whole face sours around his fork. Melodramatic. “I don’t have time to dance around your stagnant New Jersey palate anymore.”

“Uh, make a sloppy joe half as good as my dad,” Quentin calls back, craning his neck, “and then we’ll talk.”

Eliot pretends not to hear him from the kitchen.

He’s not bothering with Quentin’s pretentious _pourover please_ coffee order. But he _did_ bust out the good grind, a nice Turkish blend, and he’s even willing to perform Quentin’s unspeakable cream-to-sugar-to-actual-coffee ratio for him, so in Eliot’s estimation, it all balances out. 

“Anyway,” he says on his way back to the couch. “I had a thought.”

Quentin has his mouth full. He gives Eliot an exaggerated, wide-eyed look, and swallows before he’s done chewing. “No,” he says. “I am not still talking about this.” He grabs at the mug Eliot offers him, plate balanced carefully on his knees and already half-cleared. “Pick a new topic or I’m leaving.”

_Melodramatic._

Quentin’s a grown man. He’s capable of making responsible decisions for himself. Sure, Eliot _may have_ encouraged his full participation in all of last night’s post-game strategizing, and he _might have_ been vocal about it being a joint effort rather than an individual enterprise, but Quentin had involved himself from the start. Also, they’d both been drunk— which, Eliot has been told many times, is no excuse.

Eliot sinks onto the couch beside him. “Scandalous,” he muses, letting one arm stretch out behind Quentin’s shoulders. His plate can wait; he’ll have all the time in the world to eat in a minute. “The whole neighborhood will think I’m walk of shaming you.”

“You _are_ walk of shaming me,” Quentin grumbles. “Literally nothing else I could’ve done last night is more walk-of-shame-worthy than listening to you talk about- about friggin’ West Hollywood versus Venice Beach for twenty minutes at four in the morning.”

To be fair, it was a salient point to make. And also, again: Eliot had been drunk at the time.

He’s clearheaded now, though. There aren’t any distractions. It’s just the two of them, alone in his cozy little cottage, and the couch is already a mess. “Really,” he says, and it goes heavy and rumbling in his chest without him even trying. “Nothing at all?”

Quentin looks at him. It’s only in his eyes, a darting side-glance, but it holds, steady and dark. He looks frustrated; he’s seemed frustrated this entire time, Eliot realizes. But, like— the good kind of frustrated. The kind you can lay out and smooth down and unwind, bit by trembling bit.

Q brings his hand up to his mouth, and sucks hollandaise sauce from the pad of his thumb. “Why?” he asks, lips smacking. “Can you think of something?”

Eliot can think of a lot of things, in fact. And he does, all at once.

He could… do this now? Probably? That’s an opening, no doubt; if anything, it’s an _invitation,_ and hand-delivered, with white glove service. They’re already in the throes of the morning after. They’re not going to be interrupted like this, by Sascha Bykov or whiskey dick or anything else.

Then again, Quentin’s not what anyone would call _measured._ Just because he’s on board doesn’t mean the timing’s right. It- It might be too much, all of this, breakfast and coffee and dreamy morning sunlight, Eliot’s whirlpool-poached eggs and Quentin’s sleep-rumpled hair. Eliot hadn’t planned that, obviously, obviously he didn’t, but it’s not like it’d be the first time someone read into intentions of his that weren’t there.

But—?

He doesn’t know, he realizes. He isn’t sure. His heart is rattling around in his chest, and it’s not anticipation, it’s _uncertainty._

He plucks the little notebook out from where it’s tumbled between the cushions. “Perhaps for instance,” he suggests, brandishing it at the end of Quentin’s nose, “sneaking off to study during a dear friend’s blowout house party?”

Q’s mouth twists up into a lopsided smile. The dark, simmering frustration behind his eyes breaks. He snatches the notebook out of Eliot’s fingers, accuses, “You said it was going to be _relaxing,_ ” and easy as that, the moment is gone. 

Quentin leans back into the couch cushions to finish his breakfast. His knees swing in and out, side to side, rhythmic and relaxed— and each time they come up against Eliot’s, kneecap to calf, calf to shin, it’s a little jolt, like a bite of static electricity. 

So.

Maybe _gone_ isn’t really the right word.

  


* * *

  


Her name is Margo Hanson. Eliot’s never heard of her, and neither has Quentin. 

(“I mean, I guess maybe she looks kind of familiar?” was the precise way Quentin had described it the night before, flopped out in front of the fire in a classic Coldwater drunken starfish. In his defense, they were well into early morning already; it had taken a long time for the last few hangers-on to get the hint and filter their way out.

“Like, maybe I’ve been in the same room with her before,” he’d said, tipping his head back to get a better look at Eliot standing over him. “But I’ve definitely never _met_ her.”

“I don’t think this is a ‘maybe’ situation, Q,” Eliot had told him. He bent to set a fresh glass of wine down next to Q’s outstretched hand. “Believe me, you’d know.”

“I mean, sure,” Q answered. He fumbled back-handed for the glass, and then lifted it high over his chest in a sloppy, bitchy toast. “If you’d been there to _talk_ about it _nonstop,_ then yeah, I guess you’d be right.”

Eliot had reached out to steady the rim while he sat down. “You have no room to be judgy about enthusiasm for a project,” he said, and Quentin had made a juvenile spluttering noise that sounded suspiciously like a raspberry. “Moving on. Janet?”)

Eliot knows her _type,_ though. He’s met a thousand Margo Hansons in his lifetime. She’s cookie cutter: the same lash-heavy, smoky-eyed bitch you find at the top of the social food chain in every high school, every sorority, every marketing firm. 

(And every old-town-inspired afterlife, apparently.

“Margo Hanson is currently ranked first,” Janet had told them, “out of three hundred eighty-two, for social influence.” 

They were both on the floor by that point, flat on their backs with their shoulders tucked together. She’d had to bend over them, spine straight and hands folded behind her, and Eliot had thought that it looked like she was holding a deceptively difficult yoga pose. For, like, an actually really unsettlingly long period of time.

“Ohhhh.” Quentin rolled his head sideways to look at him. “That explains why the party tonight was so big.”

Which, uh— fucking rude?

“What?” Quentin had said, at the look on Eliot’s face, as if he wasn’t already deep in his own extended side variation of his grumpy puppy routine. “It’s what you did with Sascha. You told him and he went around and told, like, everyone.”

“Yes,” Eliot answered, and fine, yes, maybe he had been a _hair_ over-sullen about it. “I got the impression that Sascha did a good job convincing you, for example.”

And he had been expecting— something, sure, but definitely not the way Q had smiled at him all of the sudden, like Eliot had made a joke and not a passive-aggressive snipe. “Are you still being weird about this?” he said. “I told you, he’s just like that. I mean, Sascha thinks—” 

Then he’d stopped, his expression rippling the way it did sometimes when he was coming back to himself, in a bad way. They were close, Eliot remembers becoming abruptly aware in that moment— even more so with their faces tipped toward each other like that, arms a warm line from shoulder to elbow.

“Um,” Q said. “Sascha’s decided that everyone’s his friend, so.” He sat up enough to tip his empty wine glass back, searching for the last few drops at the bottom. “Anyway, what’s _your_ ‘social influence’ ranking?”

Eliot slung one arm across his forehead. “Don’t be gauche.”

“No way,” Quentin said. “There’s no way you haven’t checked.”

“Some of us have class, Q.”

Q rolled his eyes, and again— fucking _rude._ He tipped his face up to Janet, still standing right there, still smiling. “Janet, what’s Eliot’s social influence ranking? Oh, uh, but don’t say it out loud,” he added, as she opened her mouth. “Just tell me.” He cupped one hand by his ear ( _theatrical_ ), and sent his shitty, sparkling smile down at Eliot. “We should definitely respect Eliot’s _gaucheness_ boundaries.”

His eyes lit up when she told him, whatever it was.

Eliot doesn’t know, because _some people_ have _class._ )

Supposedly she lives on the other side of the neighborhood, in the sparsely-populated hills that form a natural boundary around their scenic little valley. Eliot had always assumed that they were _un_ populated, there as a built-in firewall to protect fragile human minds from splintering at the observation of infinity— and they probably are that, but they’re apparently _also_ a place for Margo Hanson to roost like the striking, heavily made-up villainess of a Disney movie.

(He’d scoffed, when Janet showed them a hazy, zoomed-out picture of the outside of her house: some McMansion monstrosity perched on the edge of the hillside. “Tacky,” he decided, polishing off his wine so that he could pour himself a new glass. “Predictable.”

He topped Quentin off too, mostly to be polite; it hadn’t taken much. Quentin had been starting to slow down by then, swirling his drink more than sipping it, mood evening out into something— not withdrawn, so much. Pensive, maybe. 

Eliot had migrated earlier to sitting propped up against the couch— he’s not as enamored with the floor as Quentin seems to be all the time; it’s all well and good for a change of pace, but it stops being cute once it starts making his wine harder to drink— and Quentin had, surprisingly but obviously reluctantly, followed him. Their shoulders nudged together, when Quentin leaned in to blink at the picture. 

“I mean,” he said, frowning. “That seems kinda harsh.”

Eliot set his palm down on the curve of Quentin’s knee. “I know, Q,” he said sweetly. “That’s the point.”

Quentin had let out a short, frustrated breath. “Okay, but, like,” he said, eyes darting up to Janet and then back again, “if you’re just ragging on her now, that’s not- that’s not something that needs to happen _right now,_ ” his leg bounced under Eliot’s hand, “is it?”

It bears repeating: Eliot is not _actually_ clueless. But he’s not beholden to Quentin and his constantly-changing moods, either. There had been a window, that window closed, and Eliot found a new outlet for his sparkling creativity and endless stamina. Q’s turn.

“I’m gathering information,” Eliot had said. “You’re a student. You know how to appreciate a proper array of data points, big and small.”

Quentin had stared at him, eyes dark and disbelieving, but only for a second. “Fine,” he grumbled. He pushed up onto his knees and twisted around, one arm clawing out across the couch for Eliot’s throw blanket. “Fine, whatever. Her house is stupid. What other _data points_ do you need?”)

Most of what he finds out is obvious. She’s younger than Eliot, but not by much. (Of course she’s a fucking Capricorn.) She prefers warm colors and gold jewelry. She’s a west coaster, born and raised in California.

(Specifically, born and raised in: “Los Angeles, California, the United States of America, North American Plate, Earth,” according to Janet.

It had stirred Q out of half-sleep, with a long sigh and fervent, fluttering lashes. In the moment, Eliot had assumed the casual, throwaway suggestion of alien life would be the target— a bad assumption, obviously. Q, bless his intrepid, born-and-raised-NYC-adjacent heart, had lifted his face just long enough to spit: “Ugh, LA _sucks._ ”

“Have you ever been to California?” Eliot asked him.

“It’s a classic case of suburban sprawl,” Q answered, which was a ‘no.’ He wiggled deeper into the couch, eyes still shut and Eliot’s blanket coiled around him. “Have you seen the number of lanes their highways have?”

“I think the accepted term is ‘freeway’.”

“Oh my god,” Quentin pulled the blanket up over his ears, “fork off.”)

Some of what he finds out… isn’t obvious. At all.

She was top of her class in college. Theatre degree, of all fucking things. She plays chess competitively. Her favorite food is tres leches cake; her favorite color is oxblood. She robbed a bank when she was seventeen, and got away with it. 

(“What the actual—” Whatever exact words he had or hadn’t used in the moment, Janet’s his only witness, and he has it on good authority that she’ll take his secrets to the heat death of the universe. “ _What?_ ”

“She stole approximately ten thousand dollars in raw currency,” Janet had said, like it was the tie-breaker at bar trivia, “and also a diamond necklace valued at thirty thousand dollars!” 

Well, she _whispered_ it like it was the tie-breaker at bar trivia. They were both whispering. Quentin was asleep at that point, and had been for a while. Eliot wasn’t sure how long. 

He could’ve just kept going. Volleying questions back and forth with Janet, prying his way into every dirty corner of Margo Hanson’s life. The next line of questioning was right there: _did she get away with it?_

_What’d she do with the money?_

_Was it enough?_

_What was she trying to get away from?_

—But he didn’t. Ask any of that, that is.

He’d gone to bed instead.)

By morning, he knows everything he needs to know. Margo Hanson is smart, her tits are nice, and she’s got the temperament of a fucking wild coyote. Formidable, he won’t lie. He can see why she thinks she measures up. He can see the allure of the challenge.

So.

War, bitch.

  


* * *

  


He catches up to Sascha outside the neighborhood’s one and only spin place. It’s called _The Cycle Path,_ and takes up half a block with its bland, boxy architecture. Its primary colors are electric yellow and lilac, and it thumps constantly with bass-heavy house music. Eliot, unambiguously, hates it with every fiber of his being, his soul, his essence, whatever the fuck you want to call whatever he is now.

But sometimes progress requires sacrifice.

Sascha isn’t there _to_ spin, thank god; he’s there to talk to Carol. Eliot doesn’t know Carol, but he’s known enough straight women who spin to know that that particular conversation could take anywhere from five minutes to twelve million years. And Eliot Waugh does not _hover,_ so instead he parks himself at the froyo place next door (there’s always a froyo place next door), orders a cup of peeling-off-an-entire-face-mask-in-one-go, and waits. 

For a while.

Honestly, he gets kinda stuck on the spin thing.

_Spin?_ Like, what the actual fuck, right? It makes him question the very nature of his afterexistence, the fabric of his new reality, every time he walks by it. Every time someone mentions it. Every time he remembers it _exists._

Can it be Heaven if it also has spin? Or is it possible the afterlife double-dips? Could this be Heaven for Carol, and Hell for Eliot, and Quentin is just, like, also here for some reason?

“Eliot!” Sascha booms, loud enough to carry down the whole block.

He’s coming up the sidewalk now, Carol off to— get shredded, or whatever, Eliot doesn’t know how spin works. He sits up in his chair, leans forward on his elbows, and salutes with the tip of his pink plastic spoon. “Sascha,” he echoes back. “Fancy running into you.”

Sascha is smiling at him as he jogs up, which is normal. But it’s in a giddy, eager way, which is— interesting. “I saw Quentin this morning,” he says, like he’s reporting news. “He seemed…” He pauses, still smiling, and then lowers his voice when he says, “... frazzled?” 

_He seemed frazzled question mark?_ being, of course, universal code for, _I noticed he was wearing the same clothes he was wearing at the party last night, what’s the deal with that?_

And here’s the thing, about Sascha. Eliot doesn’t doubt he’s every bit the guileless golden retriever he purports to be; he’s excruciatingly genuine, all the time, with few if any exceptions. But the _thing_ — which people seem to forget, and by people Eliot obviously means Quentin— is that being unironically nice doesn’t make you _not_ a gossip hound.

“Sounds like Quentin,” Eliot says mildly. He drops his eyes to watch himself scrape down the edges of his little paper cup. “One would think eternity would be enough to get him to dial it back a bit, but I guess that’s the allure of—” He doesn’t actually know what Quentin’s thesis is about. “Socrates, or... whoever.”

“Hmm,” Sascha says, just south of agreement. He doesn’t counter with anything, though, just says, “He has you to encourage him now,” and claps Eliot companionably on the shoulder. “It’s good! Very good, very good.”

Eliot dips his head. “I live to serve. Relive. Unlive? Whatever.” He drops his empty cup into the trash, and readjusts the cuffs of his jacket. “Mind if I walk the next leg with you?”

Sascha is _thrilled_ to have Eliot walk the next leg with him. 

They cut around the heart of the neighborhood square, down a side street with a cute indie bookstore (is it still a bookstore if you don’t pay for the books? is there such thing as a cute indie library?), a fashion boutique with leather purses hanging off mannequins in the window, and a tiny community theater Eliot actually- didn’t even realize was back here. 

He doesn’t explore much, he guesses. 

Sascha brings up some kind of upcoming neighborhood bonding event; a street festival, or a farmer’s market, or something else Eliot wouldn’t be caught dead at even before he was literally dead. “Sure, great, dying to hear all about it,” he says, before they get too far down the rabbit hole. “I did have _one_ quick question, though, before we dive in.” 

Sascha squirts water into his mouth from a sports bottle and nods Eliot along, ever accommodating. So Eliot cuts to the chase and says, “Do you know Margo Hanson?” 

And, look, it’s not like Eliot _expected_ to get very far here. What kind of social circle has both Margo Hanson and Sascha Bykov in it? A fucking imaginary one, that’s what. So maybe he’s not going to get a red carpet to her front door, but he figured he could get a place to start, at least. Maybe narrow in on which slice of neighborhood he should be focusing on, find out where the gaps are in his own network.

That said, it’s hard not to take it a little personally when Sascha _laughs at him,_ so hard he chokes on his water. 

“Margo Hanson?” Sascha says with a wheeze. He pounds his chest with one hand and wipes at his eyes with the other. “Yes. Yes. I know Margo. But you’re going to be disappointed, my friend.”

“Nothing to disappoint,” Eliot says. “Only curious.”

Sascha gives him a warm, friendly, deeply skeptical look. “She’s a heck of a woman,” he says with a sigh. “Heck of a woman.” Then he adds: “Not the easiest to get along with,” which is, coming from him, the equivalent of a red flag flown from the tippy-top of one of those industrial-sized public-works flagpoles.

Sascha must hear it too, because he walks it back in the same breath. “Doesn’t take bull, that’s all,” he says, and he cuffs Eliot’s shoulder like this is something Eliot specifically should be taking to heart, like Eliot might in any way give a shit, “from any man, or from anyone else.” 

Which, sure. Very feminist, good for her, hashtag boss bitch or whatever. But it doesn’t get _Eliot_ any closer to where he wants to be.

“I’ll keep it under advisement,” he says. “Any chance you know of someone she does get along with?”

“Mm.” Sascha takes another hit from his water bottle, shaking his head, and then says very plainly: “No.”

To reiterate: Sascha Bykov— the nicest gossip anyone has ever met, who makes daily rounds of the afterlife in a bald attempt to befriend every lost soul he comes across— cannot give Eliot _one single name_ of a person who enjoys Margo Hanson’s company.

Now, Eliot considers himself to be just the right amount of self-aware. That is to say: enough to be charmingly self-deprecating when the situation calls for it, but not _so_ much that the world becomes a hollowed-out death spiral of cow shit and dicks and the speckled yellow floor tiles of a church community center. 

You know. Balance.

Meaning, he knows intellectually that there’s not much room for him to be smug about the fact that, should someone feel inclined to ask Sascha the same question about _Eliot,_ the resulting list would be at least one name longer than Margo Hanson’s. 

… But there is _some_ room.

Sascha closes the spout of his bottle against his teeth with a snap. “ _But,_ ” he goes on, hushed with a promise, because you can always count on a nosy bitch to deliver, “I _can_ tell you who else I saw this morning.”

  


* * *

  


Eliot arranges for brunch the next morning with Jess and the rest of her srat squad. 

It’s a bit circumspect, sure. Not where he would’ve thought to direct his attention, either. But if Sascha is to be believed— and Eliot’s confident he is— then there’s a thin tightrope of social connections between him and where he wants to be. Put simply: Eliot is friendly with Jess, who is friends with Sorority Girl Melanie, who is fucking someone named Raquel, who trails around Margo Hanson like her desperately boring shadow (and maybe also fucks her too, no one really seems to be sure).

Not the most straightforward line he’s ever walked, but far and away not the most convoluted, either; he’s had worse times with coked-out, closeted finance bros trying to get into the back room on VIP night. And drawing from that vast well of experience, he knows that all it really takes is a light touch, careful balance, some strategic secrets-telling, and, naturally, alcohol. 

Ergo: brunch.

He gets Janet to set them up down by the water, on the bank of a lake at the center of the park. He opts for one of those long, picnic-style tables, laid out with a lovely, embroidered tablecloth and set with fresh cut flowers, just on the chic side of basic. Mimosas for the table, obviously, and tapas-style entrees: plates of mini-quiches and savory popovers and huevos rancheros. He seats himself directly across from Jess, catty-corner to Mi-jin, and three heads down from Sorority Girl Melanie at the far end of the table.

In the original version of his plan, Sorority Girl Melanie was actually two heads down, with Quentin on her other side. Partially for backup— Quentin is the perfect blend of nonthreatening good looks and sweet, unassuming awkwardness that’s like flypaper to a wallflower like Melanie— but also, just, you know. It wouldn’t have been the worst thing in the world, to have someone else to sit back and watch the fireworks with. 

Anyway, it doesn’t matter. Long story short, Quentin is busy. 

Probably. 

Eliot doesn’t actually know for sure, he hasn’t heard from Quentin since seeing him off on his self-assigned walk of shame. (Again: melodramatic.) But— probably. It’s not like there’s an overwhelming range of possibilities. If Quentin’s not with Eliot, he’s usually working on his thesis; even when he _is_ with Eliot, he’s usually working on his thesis. 

(Well, not in the last day or so. In the last day or so, he’s been taking a break from studying at Eliot’s, apparently. Which is fine. Understandable, even, if he’s trying to make up for lost time.)

Either way, it’s fine. Eliot’s perfectly capable of handling this on his own. All that really matters in the end is the main event; so long as Q is present and focused for that, Eliot doesn’t much care what he does in the meantime.

So. Brunch.

It starts out smooth enough. The group dynamic is more or less what anyone would expect from a dozen women with the same haircut, nasally laugh, and taste for neon athleisure: both overly saccharine and transparently aggressive at the same time. In other words, manageable.

He turns up the cattiness, turns down any and all notions of good taste, and keeps the champagne flowing. He’s just about ready to start nudging things in his direction, open with something simple and harmless and inane like, _Well, we all know how Kayla feels about jäger,_ when Jess purses her lips, blows on a bite of frittata that’s by definition already the perfect temperature, and says, “I saw Margo Hanson at your party the other night, Eliot.” 

In retrospect, he probably should have caught on then.

He doesn’t, though. Instead, all he sees is the easy transition; a perfect segue. Eliot swallows his swoop of victory, and focuses on frowning thoughtfully at his salmon hash. 

“Who?” he asks.

“Yeah, babe,” Jess says, and she’s talking to Mi-jin but she’s still looking at Eliot, her expression eerily calm, like a possessed soccer mom in a found-footage horror movie. He’s never fucking heard her call Mi-jin ‘babe’ since he met her. “Who’s Margo Hanson?”

The whole table goes silent and still.

Everything kinda goes to shit from there.

Here’s what he can get from context: Mi-jin has definitely fucked Margo Hanson at some point, more than once, possibly recently. And by _possibly,_ Eliot means _abso-fucking-lutely,_ and by _recently,_ he thinks, maybe, yesterday? Definitely the night of his party, but maybe also yesterday and debatably this morning, depending on how you define your terms? 

It doesn’t seem like any of this is a secret, or even news, but Jess is still transparently pissed about it. He gets the impression that Melanie is getting the ice-out from the friend group for continuing to fuck Raquel, going by the way she keeps knocking back her drinks and the way Jess keeps saying, “ _Some people_ at this table,” like she’s scolding a bus full of middle schoolers. 

He’s not sure. Honestly, he has trouble keeping up with enmeshed lesbian social webs on a good day, and today he’s really just trying to figure out when and where to crash a party he wasn’t invited to.

“Are you kidding me?” Jess is saying. The bleached tips of her high pony smack the girl next to her in the face every time she whips her head around in dramatic disbelief. “Are you _forking_ kidding me?”

“We are not exclusive,” Mi-jin bites out.

“Oh my god.” 

“And I honestly— How many times do we have to have this conversation?”

“Oh my god!”

“Because you keep _saying_ you’re fine with it, when clearly—” 

“Do not make this about something it’s not,” Jess hisses in a furious, uncomfortable, very in-public whisper. “Margo Hanson is not your forking soulmate.”

Jesus. 

Eliot drains his mimosa. When he sets it back down, it’s filled again to his precise, champagne-with-a-drop-of-color specifications. “This sounds like it’s maybe a whole thing,” he says. “Can we backtrack a bit? Just for a second?”

He was willing to put up with this insofar as the drama of it all was passably interesting; if they want to go at each other’s throats, tear each other’s hair out, fuck their problems out on the tablecloth, fine. Eliot can show up for that. But fuck if he’s going to let the situation devolve into maudlin philosophizing about fucking _soulmates._

Jess, at least, seems willing to cooperate. She spins sharply back around in her seat, and unleashes her best shiny, sparkling, rush week smile. “It’s fine,” she says to Eliot, somehow both bubbly and clipped at the same time. She bites a piece of hot chicken off the end of her fork with a flash of canines. “I should’ve remembered, nobody can measure up to perfect. Not even Margo and her bejeweled forking conch.”

_Jesus._

Mi-jin throws her silverware onto her plate with a clatter, and gets up without another word. Jess lasts maybe another thirty seconds of brutally awkward, deafening silence, ripping into her chicken and waffles with a fervor Eliot’s hardly ever seen, before she gets up too, and stalks off in the opposite direction. 

The others swarm on the drama like chum; as soon as Jess disappears over the crest of the hill, they lean their dark-rooted heads together and start talking all at once. Predictably, their takes are lukewarm at best: flattering to Jess, neutral on Mi-jin, and scathing against Margo Hanson. The word _homewrecker_ gets bandied around a bit, which— what the fuck is this? Sunday morning with the farm wives?

If you ask him, Jess is the one out of line. She’s the one projecting out expectations nobody else agreed to. You don’t just get to have things because you want them badly enough; that’s life, and if Jess expected that death would be any different, it’s her own fault. Mi-jin’s not responsible for it. Margo Hanson sure as shit isn’t. 

(Well, they _do_ ask him. What he actually says is: “Seems like a lot of energy to spend worrying over one kitten when she’s got a whole clowder,” which is close enough while also not involving him any more in this shitshow than he needs to be, so.)

It works out in the end, though, because eventually Melanie just gives up. She groans, face in her hands, and says, “God. The party tonight is gonna be _so_ forking awkward.”

Et voilà: plans for his evening.

  


* * *

  


He stays for a while, after the initial fizz of intrigue has gone flat and everyone else has scattered off to… whatever, wherever. Janet clears the table off for him, with a snap of her all-powerful fingers. She doesn’t _need_ to do that, snap her fingers, but she tries it when he suggests it, and her smile gets so big after that he thinks maybe he might’ve made a mistake.

(She doesn’t clear the tablecloth or his endless champagne glass. She leaves those, because she is an endless well of knowledge, and she gets him, and also he asks her to.)

He climbs up onto the table so that he can lounge back and watch the water without risking grass stains on his trousers. (They’re linen, and periwinkle. He’s not taking the chance, not even in fake Heaven.) He props himself up on the elbow not involved in maintaining his champagne, adjusts enough to keep the line of his spine elegant instead of awkward, and drinks.

It’s ballsy, isn’t it, for Margo Hanson to throw her party so soon. He’s a little bemused, maybe, but not actually surprised; when he thinks about it, he probably would have done the exact same thing. It’s plainly a test, plainly a _challenge:_ he can either play it safe, skip tonight and take the recovery time to plan his next move, or he can get his shit together and strike while the iron is hot.

Well. It’s not _actually_ an either-or, is it?

He taps his glass on the table to get it to refill again. “Janet?”

In the next nanosecond, she’s sitting on the table beside him, criss-cross applesauce with her hands in her lap. She’s got her hair in a cute little topknot today, and is embarking on a new and groundbreaking fashion experiment called The Color Green.

“Hi there!” she says. “How can I help?”

“I need to talk to Q,” he tells her, “but he’s being a recluse. Can you give him a message for me?”

“Of course,” she says, and thank _god._ Whose stupid fucking idea was it not to have cell service in the afterlife? “What would you like me to tell him?”

“Just tell him to come here. It’s an emergency.”

She nods, and disappears. He rolls his head back, and he’s barely decided that the cloud above him looks more like a rabbit vibe than a regular rabbit when she reappears in the exact same spot and snaps her fingers in his face. 

Definitely a mistake. 

“He says, ‘Never do that again,’” she tells him brightly, “and also, ‘Is it actually an emergency?’”

Jesus, Q. He must be fine, if he’s feeling spry enough to be bitchy.

“What?” Eliot says. “Yes. Obviously. Jesus.”

“Okay!” She blips out, and then back in. “Quentin wants to know, ‘Is it a real emergency?’ and he also says, ‘Don’t be a jerk to Janet.’”

“ _I’m_ the jerk?” Eliot echoes. “He’s the one being a backless vanity stool.” But, well. It’s not like Janet is the most socially aware abstract-concept-of-knowledge he’s ever met. He studies her big, unflinching, unwavering smile. “You know none of this is directed towards you, right?”

“Oh, don’t worry,” she says, with a conspiratorial wink that feels like looking in a strange, clumsy mirror. It might be his greatest achievement, living or dead. “I’m not affected by this in any way whatsoever.”

Good enough for him.

“Then yes, it’s a real emergency,” he says. “He has five minutes before I come crash his study party myself.”

She nods, and then she’s gone again. “He says to 'chill out,'” she tells him, when she pops back in. “And also that he'll be here soon."

So Eliot waits, sprawled out on the new historical site of his disastrous brunch and watching the clouds go by.

It’s sort of nice. He can admit to that, at least. He’s not one for nature, to put it super fucking mildly, but there’s something very French about reclining with his champagne at the edge of a lake, warmed by the sun, awash in soft-edged silence. Sometimes a breeze rustles the trees above him. Sometimes a duck breaks the surface of the water. He drinks, and sinks, and lets it swallow him up.

If someone _were_ to design Heaven for him— real Heaven, Eliot Waugh’s eternal reward, fully bespoke—he thinks it might look something like this. Quiet, luxuriant, and empty. Beautiful nothing.

It feels like… cheating, almost?

His DILF guardian-angel-slash-social-worker-question-mark? (Michael, his name is Michael) checks in on him every now and then, but never with anything of substance. It’s always, “How are things going, Eliot?” and, “Have you settled in a bit, Eliot?” and, “Whoops, gotta go, try the emmental for me, Eliot.” No indication of anything… changing, or evolving, or moving on. Just this, whatever this is, continuously, forever.

It’s weird, is all. If this is actually supposed to be Hell— daytime TV censorship, farmer’s markets, spin classes, and all— then it’s awfully benign for the kind shit Eliot got up to during his lifetime. Fuck, even just taking into consideration the shit he _remembers_ getting up to during his lifetime.

Maybe it’s a mistake. Maybe there’s another Eliot Waugh out there they accidentally swapped him with, some poor son of a bitch who’s gotten saddled with the business end of Eliot’s eternal punishment while Eliot is out here living it up in mostly-fine-ville for the rest of eternity. That’d be fucked up, wouldn’t it? Bureaucratic bullshit, even in the afterlife?

Well, even if there is— Eliot’s not a good person. That’s been established. So: sucks to suck, he guesses.

There’s a crunch in the grass behind him.

He doesn’t need to look, or even sit up. Who does he know with such abysmal standards of character, that they would abandon high-end garden etiquette to cut off the path and across the grass? No points for wrong answers.

“Question, philosopher,” Eliot announces from his diaphragm, and there’s a flutter of sound that sounds suspiciously and familiarly like, _Christ._ “Can it be Heaven if it also has spin?”

“What?” Quentin says, and then, “Why are you on the table?”

“I’m contemplating existence,” Eliot answers. He watches a cloud go by, and, despite the best efforts of whatever scraps of judgment he still has left, decides it looks like a cow. “I’m not very good at it. Figured I’d leave it to the one professional I’m aware of.”

He’s kind of drunk still. Bottomless will do that to a man, even one as practiced as he is.

Quentin takes a second to do whatever the fuck he’s doing back there. He must have brought all his books with him, because his messenger bag hits the ground next to the table with an audibly impactful _thud._ “Yeah, well,” he grunts, straightening up. “Turns out I’m not that good at it, either. So we’re both pretty SOL.”

That sounds like bullshit to Eliot, but, well. Part of the whole goal here is to _not_ let Quentin bring his work to the playground, so.

“What you _are_ is late,” he says. He swats at the spectre of Quentin’s elbow in his peripheral vision. 

(He misses, but that’s not the point.)

“Okay,” Quentin says, and his voice is warmly amused. “We’re doing this now, I guess,” and then he steps on the bench to hoist himself up onto the table, too. He sits next to Eliot in that pretzel-y way of his, one knee pulled up to his chin and the other heel folded underneath him.

“You missed brunch,” Eliot says. “And what almost amounted to a halfway decent cat fight.”

“It was almost halfway decent,” Quentin repeats. “I’m... fine with missing that,” which is, again, not the point.

“I’m not.” Eliot tilts his chin back so that he can level a proper glare, even if it’s upside-down. Q is already half-smiling down at him. “I had to sit here and listen to it alone,” Eliot tells him. “It was intolerable, Q.”

“Is this the emergency?” Quentin asks.

“No,” Eliot says.

“Because, like, I really don’t think I’m the right person for that sort of thing.”

“ _No,_ ” Eliot says again. He smacks the tablecloth between them. “Get on my level, Coldwater.”

“You want me to—”

“Stoop. Yes.”

Q sighs, but it’s one of the good ones. It’s the one that punches out of his chest with just a _little_ more force than necessary, the one that edges on the dramatic, performatively long-suffering and not-so-secretly pleased. “I’ll bet you’re not used to other people doing that,” he says dryly, as he lowers himself down.

He doesn’t take to it as easily sober as he does wasted. The table is only _just_ wide enough for them to lay together side by side, and Quentin’s brain clearly kicks into overdrive thinking about it. He stops and starts, picks his hand up and down, lets their shoulders brush when he finally makes it to his back, and then wriggles sideways to give them more breathing room.

“Why?” Eliot asks. “Are you interested in how often boys bend over for me?”

Quentin snorts a surprised laugh, and then he finally goes loose and relaxed, the edge of his left shoulder coming back up against Eliot’s right. “Okay, once again,” he says, tellingly not answering the question, rolling his head to the side to give Eliot a very professorial pointed look, “you being drunk and bored is not an emergency.”

“No,” Eliot agrees, lobbing a smile back. “The emergency was getting you out of your study hole.”

And Quentin’s expression goes... weird. Unnaturally still, in the sense that any stillness from him whatsoever is unnatural; he’s usually always twitching, always reacting, blinking and frowning and pinching and stretching. 

“Oh,” he says, and his voice is… not upset, but strange. “I wasn’t— Um. Okay.”

Eliot has the sensation of the minefield again, only this time he forgot to look before he clicked. “Just for tonight,” he says. “After that, you can descend to whatever depths you like.” And then, in the interest of transparency: “Well, TBD. But tomorrow, sure.”

“Right,” Quentin says. He blinks once, and then the weirdness passes, which Eliot doesn’t necessarily think is a good thing, but is a thing nonetheless. Quentin rolls his head back to stare at the sky again. “Uh, no, I mean, I wasn’t, like… in the zone or anything like that,” he goes on. “I just figured you’d be busy. Setting up— water features. Or whatever.” He raises his eyebrows at nothing, performatively innocent. “Hasn’t _the torch been lit?_ ”

And Eliot’s not… _ignoring_ it. But he has tact, thank you, and they’re in public. Whatever Q’s holding back, there are better times to hear it. Better people, probably.

“It has,” he answers. “That’s why we’re crashing Margo Hanson’s house party tonight.”

“Uh, _we?_ ” Q repeats, bright and bitchy, tossing a glare across the line of his shoulder, and honestly— if Eliot doesn’t think about it long enough, it’s almost like there was never a blip at all.

“Yes, _we._ ” He knocks his foot into Q’s ankle. “You’re in too deep to wriggle out of this now, Coldwater.”

Q tries unsuccessfully to frown at him. He jostles back, ankle hooking up around the bottom of Eliot’s shoe. “It’s been, like, a day,” he complains. “I’m still getting over the sleep debt from last time.”

He literally is not. “You’re playing into her trap,” Eliot says. “If we dally, we’ve lost.”

“I mean, that seems a little dramatic.” Q rolls partially onto his side, one elbow tucked under his ear, and Eliot can feel him frowning his thoughtful little frown, his brow pinching its academic little pinch. “Why is this such a big deal?”

Which is just a ludicrous thing for him to ask, honestly. _Quentin_ wants to know why it’s a big deal? Quentin, who carries around musty philosophy textbooks and spends all the time set aside for his eternal rest writing a thesis no one will ever read, to satisfy the requirements of a school he’ll never graduate from, answering questions absolutely nobody fucking asked? At least Eliot has the decency to keep his personal fixations on message.

He’s not going to _say_ that. Obviously. What would be the point? Eliot might be a dick, but he likes to think he’s a restrained one.

So what he does end up saying is, “I have a reputation to maintain.”

“Except you don’t,” Quentin returns, weirdly earnest about something that’s objectively an insult. “You literally don’t, El. We’re not—” He huffs a small, strained breath. “Things aren’t the same here as they were, um, before. Right? So, like, who gives a crap about Margo Hanson? Actually.”

When Eliot looks, Q’s mouth has twisted up into a crooked little smile. _El._ That’s cute. Like they’ve both got letters for nicknames now. Eliot wonders if Quentin even knows he said it, or if that’s just the sad fate of any and all stray syllables that get caught in the stream of his consciousness.

“Mm.” Eliot feigns deep and considerate thought. “Seven out of ten,” he decides. “Liked the energy, and good form insulting my nemesis, but points deducted for dragging me before her.”

Q’s smile curls a little more. “Right,” he says, on the knife’s edge of a laugh, “because that’s a totally normal response to what I just said, and not weird at all.”

And, really, the thing Eliot doesn’t get is... what is it about this particular hill that makes Quentin insist on dying on it all the time? Is it because they’ve discovered the soul is apparently immortal, giving him free rein to revisit the same tired _Have you considered the possibility that maybe you party too much?_ rhetoric ad-actual-fucking-infinitum?

They don’t have months, or weeks, or week _ends_ in this place. There aren’t any natural boundaries to their time, besides artificial day-and-night cycles and self-imposed schedules. There’s just days and days and more empty days, looping around on themselves, over and over, forever. So what if he has a natural urge to fill the space? So what if he’s not— dedicating his soul to solving the mysteries of human nature, or whatever it is Quentin thinks he’s doing with his time?

Eliot might not— it’s not even guaranteed that he’s going to stick around here, for the full eternity. So why not enjoy himself before he gets the pitchfork?

He bites down on his annoyance. “Look,” he says. “Can I count on you tonight or not?”

Some of the intensity in Q’s expression softens. “Well, yeah,” he says, like that’s supposed to be obvious. “Obviously.”

“Is it?”

Q frowns. His eyes dart to the side, thinking, and then he says, “Well—”

“Four out of ten,” Eliot sighs. “Points deducted for the heartless betrayal.”

Q’s smile reignites. He smacks Eliot’s shoulder lazily with the back of his hand, and then rolls over onto his back again. “Shut up,” he says, closing his eyes, tilting his chin up into the sky, into the sun. “Just tell me the plan so far.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hi, friends! A gentle reminder to take a peek at the tags again if you haven't recently. Nothing too heavy in this one, but there are some bubbles starting to come to the surface.

The plan goes like this: there are five phases, two transitions, and one non-optional postgame-slash-retrospective. 

As if anyone should be surprised, least of all Q. Eliot is detail-oriented by nature, and it’s important to be organized, here. Clear-cut. Decisive. This is his returning volley to Margo Hanson’s shot across his bow, his very own Heather Chandler moment. _Quelle surprise._

(Maybe that metaphor doesn’t work _exactly,_ but whatever. She’s a controlling bitch, she dies hungover at the beginning of the movie, it’s close enough.)

He doesn’t bother with a backup plan; Eliot doesn’t entertain failure, he manages contingencies. If they get shit from a bouncer, they know Raquel. If the bouncer wants them to pick Raquel out from the crowd, don’t take the bait, just describe the outfit of any basic bitch at a Midtown club and they’ll be fine. If the bouncer calls Raquel over, don’t panic, all they need to do is— 

“Okay,” Quentin says. “Why don’t you just tell me where to be and I’ll... be there.”

Eliot always knew he had good instincts.

He tells Quentin eleven, and Quentin shows up on his doorstep at a quarter after. On the dot, almost, like someone who abstractly understands the concept of ‘fashionably late,’ but can’t fully escape the draw of a definitive start time.

Also, he’s tied his hair back.

Now, Eliot’s acutely familiar with the whole gamut of Quentin’s messy buns and slouching ponytails— the ones that, he’s come to understand, are functional first and aesthetic entirely by accident. This isn’t that. It’s still a messy little bun, but it’s the _right_ kind of messy, the controlled kind, the ‘I-did-this-on-purpose-but-it-still-makes-you-wonder-doesn’t-it?’ kind.

Honestly, Eliot didn’t think Q had it in him.

Maybe Q didn’t either. He gets one look at Eliot’s face, and then his expression goes tight with wariness. “Hey,” he says, too calm.

It’s a red flag. He only sounds like that when his brain has forced him onto some out-of-control merry-go-round and he’s trying to pretend that he planned it that way, actually, thanks for asking. And Eliot knows his own bout of extended silence probably isn’t helping, but— come on. He’s only a man. Sometimes even he needs a moment to recalibrate.

Quentin is fidgeting with the hem of his jacket, because he’s wearing a jacket, because he _dressed up_ for the occasion. It’s basic, just a simple gray blazer over jeans and a black button-down, but on Quentin, it’s practically put together. It’s nice. On Quentin, it works.

“Should I be offended?” Eliot asks.

Quentin looks down at himself. “What?” He smooths his palm down a crease in his button-down, one that cuts right down his ribs, a blatant I-keep-my-dress-shirts-in-a-drawer violation. “I thought— Is it bad?”

“It’s good,” Eliot tells him. “That’s my point. I spend weeks subjected to a parade of formless hoodies and ratty flannel, and Margo Hanson gets your nice-jacket-singular on day one?” He sighs, and steps back to permit entrance. “Never mind, I’ve decided I am offended. Come in, please.”

Quentin smiles at him, a wry-but-in-a-self-deprecating-sort-of-way smile that Eliot thinks might be proprietary, and the red flag goes down to a yellow one. “You know, I was trying to help you out,” he says. “I mean, I’m not exactly an _entourage,_ but I figured the least I could do was try and not embarrass you.”

Eliot shuts the door behind him. “I wouldn’t have invited you if I thought that would happen,” he says breezily, and truthfully. “So, practically speaking, all you’ve done is introduce me to a new range of possibilities.” He plucks at Quentin’s left shoulder seam to even it out. “This is the fabled ‘nice one’ I’ve heard so much about?” Quentin opens his mouth, and Eliot hums before he can answer. “Rhetorical. Remind me to take you shopping later.”

Quentin bats his hand away. “Yeah, I’ll definitely do that. For sure,” he says, and he’s being sarcastic, but that’s fine. The secret is that Eliot doesn’t actually need anyone to remind him of anything, if it’s important enough. “Can I please have something alcoholic now?”

“Honestly, Q.” Eliot plucks the gin bramble off the end of the bar where he left it to wait, and turns to press it to the center of Quentin’s chest. It’s his fate to never be properly appreciated. He’s accepted it. “A day and a half apart, and it’s like you don’t know me at all.”

Quentin smiles again, and it’s a real one this time. Red flag to no flag in two easy steps. Just add alcohol.

  


* * *

  


They each get three drinks to pregame. It’s the best starting point for both of them, based on Eliot’s extensive experience and flawless instincts, with the added aesthetic spice of symmetry. Three drinks for Eliot is a blip; it leaves him coming out of the gate loose, but still focused. Three drinks for Quentin is—

Well.

“This is a horror movie,” Quentin tells him. “It’s— like, if it was theoretically still possible for us to get murdered, this is it, this is that scene.”

In all fairness, he has a point. The directions Janet gives them to Margo Hanson’s hilltop McMansion take them up a winding, sloping cobblestone path, which Eliot’s sure is perfectly charming during the day, but at night leans hard into its generously-spaced yellow lanterns and dead man’s curves. It is, in a word, spooky.

“And it’s not even a good one,” Q is saying. “This is cold open crap.” He sticks his whole arm out in front of him to count on his fingers. “Uh, you’re _way_ too intense about a house party, first of all. We’re going to a secluded place in the woods alone, at night. We’ve been _drinking._ ”

“Did I flash back to high school?” Eliot wonders.

Quentin snorts. “Right, because any character in _Scream_ actually passes for a high schooler.”

He’s cute.

The path dead-ends out at the crest of the hillside, and at first Eliot thinks they must have gone the wrong way, or taken a wrong turn. Then he thinks, _shit,_ maybe Q was right. Maybe this _is_ the post-mortem equivalent of a horror movie. Maybe this is the reveal, the part where the ground opens up under Eliot’s feet and swallows him back down to where he belongs. The road to Hell, paved with a false fucking sense of security.

_Then_ he realizes— 

“Whoa,” Quentin says. He reaches up, presses back, and the wrought-iron gate wound into the crawling, twisting wall of ivy creaks open. “Is this it?”

So, alright. 

Maybe ‘McMansion’ was— _perhaps_ — too harsh a term. 

The house itself is big, there’s no getting around that. It looms over them when they come through the gate: three floors at least, though Eliot wouldn’t be surprised if there were a basement or a fucking guest house to work with, too. But the design of it is— restrained, at least. The exterior is done up in dappled grey stone, and accented with spiraling, organic iron pieces. 

You can’t see it from the outside, because there are tall garden walls wrapped around the entire perimeter of the house. The only break is across a particularly steep drop-off down the hillside in the back; for the view, Eliot assumes. They’re functional-but-beautiful, a precise blend of heavy, impenetrable stone and delicate ironwork. It makes the space feel private and hidden, like the only reason they’ve found it at all is because Margo Hanson decided to leave the gate open for them.

As far as ‘true essences’ go, it’s— 

Fine. 

Yes. 

It’s almost elegant.

_Almost,_ because- because there’s also a row of rose trellises lined up along the entire front wall of the house. They’re gorgeous and intricate, spilled over with blossoming, wine-red flowers and not-so-hidden thorns, but, like— doesn’t that tip the whole thing over into Pinterest board territory? Honestly? The most beautiful rose, always thorns, blah blah blah.

Eliot gets a petal between his thumb and forefinger. “Seems a little on the nose, don’t you think?”

“I think you were really worried about the possibility that there might be a bouncer, considering there definitely isn’t one,” Quentin answers.

“I never worry about anything,” Eliot tells him. He drags his thumb back, entertains the notion of plucking the whole flower, letting it tumble down into the dirt, but— whatever. Not worth it. “Come on.”

He steps up to the double front doors (also inlaid with iron, also heavy and stylish and imposing). He takes a breath, rolls his shoulders back, grips both handles, and throws them open.

… It’s admittedly not the dramatic show-stopper of an entrance he’d envisioned. 

The room is dark, and _loud._ With music, with people, with the whole— vibe. There’s a massive crystal chandelier hanging over the entranceway, that’s also refracting spinning, colorized strobe lights out across the entire house. There’s a sweeping white marble staircase from the foyer to the second floor, that’s also lined with people sloppily making out against the banister. It’s like someone took the heady, over-saturated glamor of a late-night dive club, and cracked it like an egg yolk over the sophisticated, effortless elegance of a debutante ball. 

It’s grotesque. It’s fascinating. It’s fucking _weird._

“Jesus,” Quentin mutters behind him, sour and unimpressed. He ducks in under Eliot’s arm, and gives the room a disdainful once-over, played all the way out: crossed arms, frowny face, jutting chin. Which is maybe a bit much— but at least he recognizes the role he’s here to play, in all this. Eliot doesn’t have so much dignity that he’d refuse a little misguided-but-steadfast loyalty.

Whatever. Not the point. Stay on task.

Margo Hanson herself isn’t hard to find. She’s on the landing at the top of the stairs, dressed in all black: a skintight, shimmering little number that laces up in the front, leaving patchwork glimpses of skin from her navel to her chest. She’s got a pink drink in one hand and the belt buckle of some boy in the other, a forgettable thing with a prominent Adam’s apple and no charisma, who just seems happy to be included. 

She’s acting like she doesn’t know they’re there, like she hasn’t been waiting, like she didn’t put herself in that spot deliberately to keep an eye on the door.

Which brings them to phase two: first blood.

Eliot cracks his neck. “Hey, Q?”

Quentin startles beside him. He’d been distracted by a man dressed in nothing but black briefs walking by with a plate of drugs, so... even he’s not made of stone, apparently. “What?” he says, a little strangled. “Uh, yeah?”

He twists on his heel, swiveling guiltily back around. Eliot takes the opportunity to turn into him at the exact same moment, so that Q swings right into his chest— so that they’re close but don’t collide, personal bubbles melding seamlessly together. Q jolts, but doesn’t pull away; he stays right where he is, face slack, chin lifted, lips parted.

Flawless. Full points for execution.

“Oh,” Q says, more breath than sound. “Hi.”

“Mm, hi.” Eliot can feel keen attention on them now. Good. He lets himself look focused and thoughtful while he skims his hand back, tucking a stray lock of hair behind the shell of Q’s ear. 

Q’s eyes are round and dark, when the light catches against them. “Um. Eliot, what—”

“Don’t look,” Eliot instructs in a murmur. “Hold still.” He lets his fingers drop down, and indulges himself the urge to follow the line of Q’s jaw with his thumb. “Count to three for me.” 

Q’s throat bobs around a swallow. “One” he says softly. The pulse in his neck is jumping. “Two.” He breathes out in a slow, shaky exhale. “Um, three.”

There’s a crisp _clack_ of metal-tipped heels on the staircase.

Satisfaction lights up the whole length of Eliot’s spine. “Good man,” he says to Quentin, ducking close to put them temple-to-temple. “You’re doing great.”

Margo Hanson doesn’t part the crowd, as she melts down the stairs; it parts for her, pockets of people drawing each other out and away, like a school of fish. Eliot doesn’t look, not yet— what do you think he is, an amateur?— but he can just _tell,_ by the way bodies move in and out and around the spot he knows she's in.

“Well, well.” She stops at the base of the staircase, and _that’s_ when he looks; she’s smiling at them, hands on her hips, giving them both a twisting once-over. “Look who actually had the ovaries to crash.” She smiles broadly up at Eliot, and then her eyes dart left. “Hi, Quentin.”

Eliot catches Quentin’s nervy little jerk at the edge of his peripheral vision. “Hi?” Quentin answers, and that’s enough to picture the expression on his face: screwed up towards the center, halfway confused and halfway indignant, unsure if he should be offended or not.

Margo Hanson ignores him. She steps forward, eyes narrow and evaluative, and plucks at the open edge of his jacket with gleaming golden nails.

Quentin’s learning. He goes stiff, but doesn’t move.

“Anyway,” she says, at him but not to him, “candy’s circulating, bong circle’s out back. Dancefloors are ground level, balcony level, and basement level, depending on where your vibe is. Bother Janet if you want a drink, I’m not your waitress. I’ll find you if I feel like it, so don’t come looking for me otherwise. We clear?”

Eliot declines to answer, but she says, “Great,” before Quentin has a chance to. She pats his cheek once, and then winks at Eliot over her shoulder as she twists away. “Have fun, boys.”

Well, fuck him gently with a chainsaw.

“Why does she always do that to me,” Quentin grumbles, once she’s gone. His hands come up to self-consciously fiddle with his collar. “You’re the one she’s feuding with.”

He’s serious, apparently. He’s also inadvertently flipping his collar up in the back. “Oh, Q.” Eliot reaches out to flatten it down again. “Alcohol will help. Are we feeling a bourbon or vodka kind of night?” 

“Have you seen this place?” Quentin answers. “Uh, yeah, vodka.”

Eliot can do vodka. “Janet?”

She clashes terribly with the aesthetic of the party, buttoned up to the throat like that, but good on her for sticking with a look that works for her. “Hi!” she says, blipped right into the space between them. “How can I help?”

“I need martini glasses,” he tells her. He plucks an octagonal vase (not the ugliest thing he’s ever seen, in all fairness) off a nearby console table to make room. “Chilled. Vodka and vermouth. A mixing glass, with ice. And—”

“Are you serious?” Quentin says. “You’re still going to make it yourself?”

“My standards don’t go down just because we’re on enemy turf, Q.” He takes the mixing glass when Janet holds it out to him. “No offense, Janet.”

“As I’ve said,” Janet says cheerfully, “it’s not possible for me to take offense, because I have no emotional investment in this at all.”

Eliot gestures to her with the mouth of the glass in a show of ambivalent solidarity. “See?”

“El—”

“And an olive,” Eliot says to Janet. “Just the one is fine. If you don’t mind, Janet.”

Janet doesn’t mind. 

Q doesn’t end up finishing his thought; he goes quiet, watching Eliot finish up instead. He’s got this look he gets sometimes, where the lines of his face are exasperated but his eyes are bright. Like he can’t help himself, even when he tries.

Eliot focuses; his standards apply all the way through to the garnish, so there’s no room for half-assery now. He skewers the olive at an angle, and sets it in the glass just _so,_ suspended in the center of the drink instead of lolling at the bottom.

When Eliot straightens up to hold the glass out, Q is still watching him, still with his arms folded and that— look, on his face.

“Remember when we talked about overkill?” Q says.

“I don’t know the word,” Eliot answers. “Are you declining the drink?”

He’s not, obviously. It’s a good fucking drink.

That decided, Eliot scoops up his own glass in one hand, and Quentin’s far shoulder in the other. “Relax,” he says. “This is still phase two, remember. We need to keep you loose. How about...”

He sets to scanning the room, scouting out conversation circles and activity boundaries and social hotspots. He wants to start Q off with something that will challenge him but not overwhelm him, something that will get easier as the alcohol kicks in. There’s a gaggle of goth-looking types by the window, maybe that could work. Build some confidence.

Quentin, for his part, seems more focused on gulping half his drink down in one go. 

“ _Relax,_ ” Eliot says again. “I’m not going to—”

Quentin shakes his head. He swallows his mouthful, chin dropping down to his chest. “Okay,” he sighs, and— jesus, Eliot can’t take him anywhere— wipes his mouth on the heel of his hand. “I’m good, you can go now.”

Sorry. What?

Eliot cranes his neck down; Q is already half-smiling back up at him. “I’m sorry, what?” Eliot says. “ _I’m_ dismissed?”

“Yeah,” Q says, and then, before Eliot even has a chance to react to whatever _that_ tone is, “I’m serious. I don’t need a babysitter. You do your thing, and I’ll go do, like— recon. Divide and conquer, right?”

“Quentin Coldwater,” Eliot marvels. “Are you offering to be a mole for me?”

Quentin raises his eyebrows and mimes closing a lock over his mouth while he’s dipping out from under Eliot’s arm. “ _Go,_ ” he says again. “I’ll come find you later and we can, like, sync our watches or whatever.”

It’s weirdly confident and— ridiculous, _he’s_ ridiculous. Eliot watches him dart off through the crowd (toward the window and the goth-types, because Eliot’s instincts are always spot-on, thank you), and Margo Hanson’s den of depravity will eat him alive, no question— but it’s the thought that counts, isn’t it?

Eliot ruffles one hand back through his hair. He finishes his drink, and sets his shoulders back. 

Conquer, it is.

  


* * *

  


For anyone still counting: Eliot is on phase four. 

Probably.

He thinks.

Look, the plan is a living document, right? And Eliot prides himself on being adaptable. Here he is, adapting in real time; he and Q have divided to conquer, and so naturally milestones are shifting to accommodate. Phase three, phase four, phase five. Who really cares, in the end? All roads lead to Rome.

Also, he got a bump of ketamine from a blond boy in nothing but black briefs and a nose ring about fifteen minutes ago.

(The same one as before? A different one? Whatever, and also, again: who fucking cares.) 

He’s on the balcony dancefloor, because one: obviously, and two: it has better music than whatever acid house trash is getting spun downstairs. The BPM is higher, and the bass reverberates out into the crisp, clear air, into the night, into the fucking— expanse of eternity, instead of thumping off the walls and the ceiling and slamming back against his eardrums. He likes it. It’s a nice complement to the syrupy, slanted sweet spot of his high, where he feels like a ripple on the surface of reality, all soft transient energy, derealized and disconnected.

His eyes are closed. There are hands on his hips that he’s half-to-two-thirds sure aren’t his; there’s a warm, solid body behind him, a boy behind him, Micah or Mike or Miles or something. Doesn’t matter. One, two: Miles’ hands on his hips. Three, four: hands that _are_ Eliot’s, okay, hundred percent there, one swiping his hair back from his forehead, the other around a sweating vodka tonic. Five— 

Five, hand five. What the fuck?

He looks down, and Margo Hanson’s big, fluttery doe eyes are gleaming back up at him. 

She’s in front of him, eyes dark, shoulders rolling to the music, one hand against his chest. He doesn’t know how long she’s been there, but he also doesn’t think he needs to; he knows her, knows what she’s like, because she’s just like him— and bitches like them don’t suffer obscurity.

She smiles, once she has his attention. She crooks a finger under the lapel of his waistcoat, tugs down hard, and says, “Dance with me.”

He gets a thrill in his gut, because, like, this is a win for him, right? Obviously, right? She cracked first, she approached him first. And fair enough— he’s a vision, he’d want to fuck with himself too, literally, metaphorically, however you want to slice it— but it’s still a concession. Point Waugh. Demerit Hanson.

(Or whatever. He doesn’t know sports.)

She’s good at pretending she hasn’t noticed, or doesn’t care, or whatever, but that’s fine. She might be tacky, but she’s not _stupid_ ; she knows, and Eliot knows, and Eliot knows that she knows, and she knows that Eliot knows she knows. 

… And Miles also knows, he guesses. Assuming he’s not a fucking idiot, which Eliot will admit is a substantial assumption. 

Eliot arches back into a body roll, and lets his left palm find the nape of Miles’ neck. “Miles and I are dancing,” he says.

“My name’s Mitchell,” Miles says.

Whatever.

Margo Hanson frowns. Her eyes dart up past Eliot’s shoulder, like it’s the first time she’s thought to notice anything in the space there— and then her nose wrinkles, like she’s disgusted at what she’s uncovered. 

What a bitch. Eliot almost forgets that he’s not supposed to laugh.

She pulls herself in close by her fingertips, hips rolling flush with his, sandwiching him in. She sets her chin against his shoulder, and leans over to lay one delicate hand on Mmwhomever’s arm. “Hey, Miles?” she says, voice floating into a sweet, airy register. “You’re third-wheeling.” 

She doesn’t wait for him to answer. The points of her nails dig in deep, she cuts out a glare that honestly might make _Eliot’s_ dick shrivel if he were on the wrong end of it right now, and then her voice crash lands into something low and gravelly and commanding: “You’ve got five seconds to move on before I _make_ you move on.”

Miles jerks away. He says something, but Eliot doesn’t hear what. Or, maybe he does, but he doesn’t remember. He doesn’t really give a shit. He’s busy watching satisfaction spill across Margo Hanson’s face like cream, like honey, like something they’d zoom in on in a music video while she swiped it away with her tongue.

She winds both arms up around his neck. He was right: she slots in right under his chin. “There,” she says. “Much better.”

What an absolute, unapologetic, glorious fucking _bitch._

“Congratulations,” he tells her, “you’ve successfully garnered my attention.” His palm fits neatly around the ridge of her hip. “So. What do you want?”

She flutters her lashes, lips full and pouty and mocking. “Who says I have to want anything? It’s a hostess’ duty to entertain her guests, isn’t it?”

“Oh,” he says mildly, “I thought we were beyond the Bambi charade by now. My mistake.” 

The look in her eyes flashes into a glare. It’s not on the same level of dick-shriveling as the first one, but— it’s not _not._ “Call me that again and I’ll twist your cork off myself,” she says, without a drop of restraint, irony, or shame. “And I’ll wear my acrylics while I’m doing it.”

“Kinky,” he says. Her smile shows the points of her teeth. “But you haven’t actually answered my question.”

She lifts her chin. Her eyes are narrow and glittering. And then—

And then the world kind of— falls apart, a little. 

That makes it sound more dramatic than it is. It’s like a sauce breaking in a pan, or like kombucha mother gathering at the bottom of a bottle; pieces of reality splitting apart and separating, settling side-by-side instead of coalescing together. There’s the music, and the diffused outdoor lights, and the sweat on the back of his neck, and heat of Margo Hanson’s body, and the rigid laces of her dress, and the strange, curious, fascinated, familiar look in her eyes. 

He’s high as shit. Obviously. 

But still, Eliot thinks this is probably why most people do drugs. It’s at least thirty percent of the reason _he_ does drugs.

“I don’t know,” she says finally, her voice surprisingly even. Surprisingly honest. Her fingers find the wispy curls at the nape of his neck. “I’ve heard a lot about you. Guess you piqued my interest.”

“I’ve only just now started hearing about you,” he says. “I get the sense that’s not an accident.”

She wraps a lock of his hair around her pointer finger, tight enough to light up his scalp with not-quite pain. “Accident?” she hums. “I don’t know the word.”

The song is changing. Margo Hanson doesn’t fuck around with fade-ins or mixes or break slams; the song just _changes,_ with a reverb of bass that pounds through his chest like a second heartbeat. 

His head is spinning, a little. It reminds him of the first drop of a rollercoaster, even though he hasn’t been on a rollercoaster in fucking— years. How it lets you hang over the edge for a few seconds, a handful, maybe less, but long enough that you can feel your ears pop, and your stomach lurch, and your lungs clamp down on the last breath you took. Long enough to think, _No turning back now._

“I think I could use another hit,” he decides.

“Oh, sweetie,” she says, arching up against him, nails sharp and promising against the side of his face. “ _Now_ we’re talking.”

  


* * *

  


There’s always a certain amount of camaraderie that comes from doing lines with someone. It’s inevitable. There are steps, it’s a process, and everybody gets off on a dash of ritualism every now and then; it’s just a matter of what flavor you’re into. Drugs, sports, cults, dungeons and dragons. It’s all the same, when you think about it. 

It’s a simultaneous rush. A shared euphoria. A fucking— hive mind. That split second of expanded sensation where it’s your blood rushing through someone else’s veins, tingling to the surface, intoxicating and exhilarating, filled with promise, with potential, with just, like— _so_ much fucking oxygen.

Maybe that last point doesn’t apply as much to dungeons and dragons. He should ask Q. Q seems like the type to be a D&D nerd, right?

“If you ask him that,” Margo says, one elbow on the bar, “he’ll cream his pants on the forking spot.”

She’s sweaty, in a glistening, hot girl sort of way. They’ve been dancing for a while; Eliot couldn’t say how long. She scoops her hair up off her neck with her nails, ties it off into a neat twist on the crown of her head, and that’s all it takes to shift her whole vibe from ‘San Diego sex dungeon chic’ to ‘New Haven sex dungeon chic.’ 

Fuck her for making it look that easy, honestly.

Anyway, the point he’s trying to make is: there’s a nonzero chance this is just the drugs talking, but he thinks the whole fucking neighborhood might’ve been full of shit when they were telling him about her.

“Mm.” He pushes himself off the bar, too, and holds one hand out. “Do you promise?”

She gives him a hard-edged grin, her fingers tangling with his. “Only if you let me watch,” she answers, yanking herself back into his chest. They’re not even on the dancefloor anymore, they detoured to do neat little rows of tequila shots— it doesn’t matter how many— but, like, who gives a shit. They can hear the beat, ergo: this _is_ the dancefloor.

Also, Eliot’s pretty sure they’re being stalked.

There’s a kid at the other end of the bar, watching them. He’s been watching them for a while, in-between pounding what look like watered-down vodka redbulls. Eliot doesn’t recognize him, but he looks familiar: dark hair and pasty skin and a prominent Adam’s apple. It’s a little creepy, sure, but mostly it’s just annoying; the kid’s not subtle, and he’s killing Eliot’s vibe from halfway across the balcony. 

Eliot ducks his head down to put his lips next to Margo’s ear. “Do you have a shadow?” he asks. “Specifically, a shadow who’s hoping to get NC-17 with you?”

She blinks one aggravated eye open. “What?”

“I mean, I assume he’s after you. Do you think straight men are legally mandated to have that haircut, or is it part of that ‘true essence’ thing they’re always going on about around here?”

She tips her head back to glare at him. Her hair smacks against his left cheek. “What the fork are you talking about?”

“Ten o’clock,” he tells her. “Red polo. Could stand to undo a button or two.”

Her chin snaps down to send her glare across the balcony. She’s not particularly subtle, either, he’s coming to find. “Je _sus,_ ” she groans, when she finds That Great Song By The Police for herself. “You give a bench five minutes, and he refuses to get off your chit the rest of the forking night.”

“The age-old struggle,” Eliot agrees. He lets his brain roll around the possibilities, lets his chin balance on tippy-top of her twisty bun. “Want to get rid of him?”

Her nails curl into the tender skin of his inner wrist. “Excuse me?”

Ugh. No. 

“Relax,” he says. “I don’t care about your womanly honor. Eviscerate him on your own time if you want. I’m high and bored and he’s ruining my view.”

She does relax, sort of. The well-manicured claws don’t retract, but their drag on his skin turns more contemplative than retaliatory. “Maybe,” she allows, after a moment. “What are you thinking?”

What _is_ he thinking? Hmm. “Let’s keep it simple,” he says. “What’s his name?”

“How the fork should I know?”

Fair enough. 

The kid finally cottons on to Eliot looking. He doesn’t shrink back when he’s caught, though— he _glares._ “He seems like a Spencer,” Eliot says. “I’m going to go with Spencer.” He pats Margo’s elbow. “Count to twenty,” he instructs, “and think _Teeth,_ ” and then he cuts out through the crowd.

To his... something, Eliot doesn’t know that _credit_ is really the most accurate term here, Spencer doesn’t quail, or run, or hide. He holds his ground, and knocks back another vodka redbull. “What the heck, man?” he says, when Eliot reaches him. “You’re corkblorking me.”

“Gross,” Eliot says.

Spencer glowers at him. “Oh, don’t be like that,” Eliot says, and swings one arm around his shoulders. “I’m doing a good deed, okay? Man to man.”

Spencer wriggles, uncomfortable but too proud to shake Eliot off. “Oh, yeah,” he says. “Lemme guess, she’s _crazy._ Or, uh, or are you gonna go the ‘check out how many other cool girls are here tonight’ route? C’mon, dude, don’t bullshirt me.”

Please, it’s too easy. Eliot doesn’t say anything; he clenches his jaw and looks away, giving the natural wood grain of the bartop his best thousand-yard stare.

“... What?” Spencer says carefully.

Eliot lets his eyes flutter closed. He takes a deep, stabilizing breath. “Okay,” he says. “Okay. Here’s the thing.” He meets Spencer’s gaze with painful, protracted effort, and drops his voice low. “Have you ever heard of vagina dentata?”

Spencer hasn’t, because of course he hasn’t. Off his blank look, Eliot says, “You know.” Spencer shakes his head, and Eliot says, “Teeth. _You_ know.”

It takes a second. But he gets there.

Spencer’s expression contorts, and he shoulders out from under Eliot’s arm. “Man, whatever. Fork off.” He starts to move away, but Eliot grabs him by the bicep, grave and grim.

“Think about it,” he says quietly. “Do you _really_ think the afterlife is an Earth-exclusive? Who’s to say there’s not women from all over, right? And who’s to say they might not have—” He sighs harshly. “I’m just telling you what I know, okay? I’m warning you. Man to man.”

There. That flicker of uncertainty, that’s all it takes. Spencer glares, and then he frowns. He opens his mouth like he’s got something to say, but then his eyes dart to the side, past the edge of Eliot’s shoulder, and—

Twenty.

“Hi, boys,” Margo drawls as she comes up behind him. Eliot gives Spencer’s shoulder one last squeeze, flashes him a meaningful look with just a _hint_ of crazy eyes, and then straightens up to receive her.

She tucks herself into his side, one hand fluttering against his chest like they’re posing for a prom photo. “What’re we talking about?”

“You, of course,” Eliot says. And Margo Hanson, with flawless timing, smiles broadly up at him, hooks her fingers into the front of his waistband—

— and snaps her teeth.

When he looks back over, Spencer’s pasty skin has faded to paper white. “Yeah,” he says, voice wavering. “Yeah, it’s great. This is great. Having a great time. I’ll— um. I talk to you later, okay Margo?”

“Okay,” she hums, and he’s already scrambling away. “Bye, Spencer!”

“Bye!” Eliot trills.

They both crack at the same time. Right when Spencer turns the corner, out of sight, swallowed by the crowd, they _break,_ Margo doubled over with her arms hugging her ribs, and Eliot bent over her, hands on her back for balance. 

“Did you see—!” She can’t even finish. She has a shrieking, witchy, cackling laugh.

“I basically had to spell it out for him,” Eliot gasps. “I had to- I had to—” He clasps her shoulders and pulls her to him, so that he can stare deeply into her eyes. “ _You_ know,” he recounts grimly. “Man to man.”

She stares back at him, pupils dark and dilated— and then she snaps her teeth again, right under the tip of his nose.

It’s too perfect. It’s too good. He loses it all over again, gripping the edge of the bartop so he doesn’t completely eat shit on the floor of her fancy balcony bar.

“Brava, Bambi,” he tells her when he has his breath back. “The world hasn’t seen a performance like that yet, or since.”

“Shut the fork up,” she says, breathless and laughing and so fucking high, “and do another shot with me.”

  


* * *

  


“Raquel,” he tells her.

They’re taking a break, passing a spliff back and forth over the balcony’s back railing. It’s the only way he opts for weed anymore; the extra hit of nicotine balances everything out, keeps him up and alert and moving. Otherwise he’d end up sprawled on his living room floor, stoned out and paranoid and letting perfectly adequate chocolate chip cookies burn in his oven. Not a good look for anyone.

Plus, it’s more European this way. 

He wonders if he’d still get paranoid on a not-Heaven joint. Probably, right? If they’re, like, trying to keep him comfortable by replicating his experience of his own brain chemistry as closely as possible?

But paranoia’s by definition not comfortable. That’s gotta be part of the equation. Because he’s been swerving all over the fucking map here, even just tonight; coke and K and weed, a little bit of molly, some pretty green pills he forgot to ask the name of— oh, and alcohol. Can’t forget alcohol. Oldest and dearest friend, alcohol.

Usually he feels like shit, after all that. During all that. Usually he’s just also high enough that he doesn’t _give_ a shit, during. And he’s certainly high enough now to not give a shit, that’s true, but he also feels— fine.

Is that weird? Maybe it should be weird. Right now he’s not feeling any aches, any pains, any splitting sensation behind his eyes or rolling nausea. He’s not feeling anything, he doesn’t feel _like_ anything, he feels— 

His own heartbeat is in his ears, suddenly, and rabbit-fast. Which is stupid, because he’s- fine. He feels fine. He is fine.

And it doesn’t fucking matter anyway, does it? That’s the point. The whole— fucking point.

He takes another hit.

Margo has scrunched her nose up, a button beneath her round brown eyes. He thinks he’s onto something with the deer thing. “Wait,” she says, “how the fork do you know Raquel? No shade, she’s hot as shirt, but the girl’s got a personality like chewing on wet cardboard.”

What the fuck?

Who?

— Oh wait, oh wait. Right, right, right. They were talking about how he and Q got in. Jesus, all that shit with Jess and Mi-jin and what’shername and _soulmates,_ that was all today. This morning.

“Who says you have to know someone in order to namedrop them?” he answers. “A not-so-little birdie told me about her and Melanie.”

The scrunch extends to her browline. “Who the fork is Melanie?”

“One of your kitty cat srat squad.” He cuts one hand out in front of his chest. “Yea high. Glasses. Sloppy lob.”

Margo’s face pops smooth with surprise, and then she laughs her cackling witch-laugh. “Oh my _god,_ ” she says, her head dropping back. “I remember her. Jesus, I need to tighten my shirt up.” 

“You really do,” he sighs. “Here I was, expecting a challenge. Thought you’d at least have the decency to spring for a bouncer.”

“Fork off.” She flicks her hand out at him, demanding, and he ignores it. “This place would still be in full-scale primetime sitcom territory if it wasn’t for me. You’re _welcome._ ”

“You’d be lost in a sea of boring if it wasn’t for _me,_ ” he fires back lazily, letting his gaze trail off across the balcony. “Who did you have to compete with before? Sascha? Please.” He takes another hit, and she glares at him. “I’ll be expecting a thank you arrangement in the mail. No baby’s breath, it’s a filler.”

As an aside, totally unrelated, not at all important: Quentin’s not in the same spot he was a minute ago.

He came out earlier, around the same time Eliot starting cutting his coke with more K. Eliot hadn’t gone to check on him, because he’s not _checking on_ him— he just noticed, he’s noticing. Q doesn’t need a babysitter, but they’re on the same team, here. They’re on a mission. It follows that they should be coordinating as much as possible. 

Margo sniffs, or scoffs, or laughs, or— something. Eliot’s not sure what to read out of the sound she makes. “Loving your little white knight, by the way,” she says, apropos of fucking nothing, and he realizes belatedly that she’s snatched the spliff back from him. Bitch. “So loyal. Real fall on his sword type.” She takes a hit, and lets her eyes drop suggestively down. “Or maybe just on _your_ sword, hm?”

Jesus, Eliot hopes so. Like, fine, he knows that he’s being patient, or… whatever. Whatever people do when they wanna fuck someone but also still get to talk to them again at some point afterwards, and not just via dick pics and two AM sexts. He doesn’t know if there’s a word for that.

But jesus _christ,_ he hopes so.

“What did he say to you?” he asks.

“Nothing.” She leans back, both elbows at the railing, and frowns at the sky. “Literally. Cutie clams right up whenever I get within five feet of him.” She sighs, setting the point of her chin against her shoulder to look over at him. “It’s so annoying it’s almost charming.”

What a bitch. And he does mean Quentin, this time. Eliot manages to resist the urge to laugh again, but it’s a near thing. 

— Okay, there. There’s Q. He doesn’t tend to wander far, as a general rule, so it only takes a second of scanning to find him. He’s tucked up on a hightop barstool, talking animatedly with some girl Eliot doesn’t recognize (pretty, dark hair, septum piercing) who seems pretty checked out of the conversation, if Eliot’s being honest. 

The bottle cap has made an appearance, so it’s that stage of the night, apparently. Q doesn’t like repeating the same trick too often, so he rotates through a collection of so-called ‘translocation’ tricks that he has memorized (of which there are apparently just so, so many); Eliot’s seen this one, though. It’s one of the flashier ones, which is why Q likes to break it out at parties.

(The cap he’s using is the same one Eliot gave him the night they met, bronze and scratched and flared out on one side from the flourish Eliot used to pop it off the bottle. Q keeps it in his pocket.

Again, to be clear: Eliot is not actually clueless.) 

“What’s the deal with you two?” Margo asks him. She purses her lips around her exhale, smoke rippling and dispersing between them. “I mean, there’s no way you’ve banged him yet. He’s too eager. Nobody who wants it that bad has gotten it already.” She offers him the spliff back, simpering over her pinched fingers. “Need some help? A little sugar to help the cork go down?”

Bitch.

“I’ll pass,” he says, to her and her shitty spliff.

She pops it back between her lips. “Mm. Your loss.” And then she cranes her neck, cups her mouth with one hand, and shouts: “Hey, Quentin!”

Q jolts, shoulders jumping to his ears. He swivels around, and for a second can’t seem to find where the sound came from; his hands hover up by his shoulders, the bottle cap still tucked into the pocket of his palm, and his eyes are narrow, jumping in quick saccades across the balcony. 

She wants to do this? Fine.

“Hey!” Eliot bellows too, and his voice must carry farther, because Q’s eyes snap right to him. “Q! Get over here!”

Q smiles at him. The cap goes back in his pocket, as he pops off his stool.

— And then Eliot watches him remember, in real time, the conversation he just abandoned. Quentin twists around as he’s literally walking away from what’sherface, and Eliot can’t make out what he’s saying, but he thinks he can imagine the gist. _”Sorry! I gotta— Uh, bye!”_

He’s cute.

“Hi, Q,” Margo says when he reaches them, melodic and sweet.

Quentin looks at her. Then, with some of the most exaggerated telegraphing Eliot’s ever seen, he glares pointedly away. It makes Margo roll her eyes, and she gives Eliot a pointed brow raise with her head tilted over her right shoulder like, _See?_

_Bitches._ Fucking— both of them. This time Eliot does laugh, straight into his drink. Jesus, this is why he doesn’t smoke weed.

Quentin’s in a surprisingly good mood, for Quentin. Eliot would’ve expected a party like this to wear him out a lot sooner, but he’s smiling, and he lets himself be drawn in under Eliot’s outstretched arm as soon as it’s close enough to get around his shoulders. He rubs his cheek against the textured fabric of Eliot’s lapel, over and over, stubble prickling, like an oversized cat scenting the leg of a couch. When he looks up, his eyes are wide and his pupils are dilated, even under the outdoor lights.

_Oh._

“Hello there,” Eliot says, folding him in. “Someone got into trouble while he was away.”

“No,” Q says, brightly earnest. “No, it’s, uh— I’ve been thinking about this, right?”

Of course he has. “Mmhm.” Eliot cups one hand around the back of his head. The knot of his bun has gone a bit lopsided. “Of course you have.”

It doesn’t really matter, because Q is already talking. “Because we, like, we talked about it,” he says. “Well, sort of, but— you know what I mean. About the, uh, the morality system built inherently into the afterlife, or- or especially the lack thereof, right? Remember? Like how there are these whole sets of actions or, uh, um, _choices,_ that in the real world are stuck with a bunch of negative moral connotations. But _here_ —” He pokes Eliot in the chest, coming up high on his toes. “Here we’re outside the bounds of regular society, right? So some of those things become, like, morally neutral. You know? So then the question is, um— what’s the moral system driving the afterlife? If nobody can get, like, evicted, or sick, or- or physically hurt, then—” 

“Ugh,” Margo interrupts. “No. This is not why I called you over here. Get lost if all you two are gonna do is re-enact vanilla Philosophy 101 roleplay.”

Quentin’s head swivels toward her. “Why did you call me over here, then?” he snaps— and there it is. 

Margo’s whole face lights up with predatory delight. 

“Just making sure you remember who’s in charge here, cutie,” she tells him, reaching out to pat his cheek. “Now, we drinking or what? Mama needs another round to come back from this bullshirt.”

Quentin snorts a sharp, surprised laugh. His eyes dart up to Eliot, and then back out at Margo again. “What?” he says, with a bubbling disdain that, truly, Eliot thinks they must only teach in the Ivy League. “You- You’re serious?”

Margo rolls her shoulders back, the dominant posture of a woman who definitely owns a strap or five. “I said what I said,” she answers cooly. “If God’s got a problem with it,” she leans in close, glossy lips forming round and deliberate around every syllable, “that bench can soak my forking chit. Capisce?”

Quentin stares at her— at her mouth, specifically, before he gets ahold of himself enough to pick that shit up— eyes big and incredulous and, appropriately, a little terrified. “ _That’s_ the censored version?” he says.

Margo smiles like cyanide, hands on her hips. “Drinks,” she reiterates without answering, and then snaps her fingers over one shoulder. “Janet!”

Janet brings them more drinks.

  


* * *

  


Eliot doesn’t know what time they leave. It’s dark, he’s drunk, and the streets are empty: that’s all he’s got. Q is a few feet ahead of him, playing some kind of walking game with himself where he’s not stepping on cracks, or maybe only stepping on every other cobblestone, or something like that. He’s almost as fucked up as Eliot is, though, so he keeps tottering around and almost falling over, arms windmilling around him.

He’s talking about something. Eliot tries to remember what. He thinks he tuned back in for Harrison Ford awhile ago? No, no, he definitely did; he remembers, because the context had been sci-fi but _not_ Star Wars, and Q had gotten all riled up about… something. Not about Harrison Ford, about Star Wars and whatever not-Star Wars thing he was talking about.

Honestly, Eliot’s got no fucking idea. He just likes to watch Q pop off like that, the way his stop-and-go anxiety suddenly snaps together, unselfconsciously seamless, all movement and crackling energy.

(Eliot might also be a _little_ bit high still, too.)

“—and then, and _then,_ ” Q is saying now, “it’s like— boom, right?” He blows his hands up on either side of his head, and rains it down like imaginary debris, fingers wobbling all around. “I just, I get it. All of a sudden. You know?”

He’s cute.

“Mmhm,” Eliot agrees, which is a mistake.

Q’s head swings toward him. His eyes are wide, like Eliot’s ambushed him with the second half of a conversation. “Right!” he says, stopping in his tracks, right there in the street, all earnest breathlessness. “Of- Of course you would get it too, right?” 

“Yes,” Eliot lies.

“I mean, I know it’s probably different for you,” Q says, unhelpfully. “You’re— um. It’s just, it’s different. But, like, the core of it is there, right?” 

“Right,” Eliot lies again, now officially in too deep. There’s no way to dig out, so the best he can do is dig through: “... We _are_ talking about acid, right?”

Q’s face falls. It’s in a gentle, indulgent, familiar way, though; Eliot’s a disappointment, but at least he’s a charming one. Q lets him get away with it, anyway. “I mean, maybe,” he says. He hovers where he is, rocking on his heels, waiting for Eliot to catch up. “I’ve never tried.”

“What, never?” 

Q shrugs. He jostles their elbows when Eliot reaches him, and Eliot takes the opportunity to hook them together. “I’m surprised,” he says. “Did I or did I not witness you popping pills like pez tonight?”

“That’s different,” Q says, even though it absolutely isn’t. “That’s now. Before, I was... um.” He ducks his head, and something— shifts. “Um, anyway.”

Click. That’s a mine, tripped.

And Eliot doesn’t... know what’s happening, precisely. His brain feels like a film reel with half the frames cut out: choppy and disjointed and losing more and more scraps of meaning every second. He’d thought they were having a good time, a good night. He wants them to be having a good night. He wants Q to have a good night.

“Anyway,” he agrees, to smooth out that spiky little sea urchin of a segue, “you’re holding out on me, Coldwater.” Q’s face tilts up at him, quizzical. “You were my inside man,” Eliot reminds him. “I assume you’ve cracked the case. Narrowed in on the enemy’s greatest weakness. So spill, Sheryl.”

He watches gears churn behind Q’s eyes. “Oh shirt,” Q says when it clicks, his face lighting up again, and Eliot decides to let that one slide. Out of the goodness of his heart. “Yeah. Yeah, I figured it out. Uh, cracked it wide open. Easy.”

“Did you now?” Q nods, with the full input of his head and neck and shoulders. It sets him off balance again, and the whole swaying line of him lists into Eliot’s side. “Well, go on,” Eliot tells him. “Don’t leave us in suspense.”

Q grins. He leans in, a heavy weight on Eliot’s elbow, and says in a conspiratorial stage whisper: “You and Margo Hanson _like_ each other.”

Eliot shoves him.

“Et tu, Makepeace?” he demands, while Q is busy having the audacity to _giggle_ at him, half doubled-over in the street. “I trusted you.”

“You can lie to yourself if you want,” Q tells him. “But, uh, I saw what I saw.” He skips a little bit to catch up, which honestly should be a war crime. “You were having _fun._ ”

“It was a party,” Eliot says. “None of this would be in contention at all if she weren’t capable of throwing a halfway decent party.”

Q gives him a hard, skeptical look, like they’re on opposing podiums in fucking debate club. He’s cute. “It wasn’t just the party,” he says. 

“Interesting hypothesis,” Eliot says. “Let’s revisit, shall we?” He pivots so that he’s walking backwards instead, to give Q the best view of Eliot counting off points on his fingers. “Drinks, check. Drugs, check. Dancing, check. Crushing the spirit of some boring twink via elaborate lies, uh, _check._ ”

“You did what?”

Eliot waves him off. “Not the point. The point is, all of those things are fun, and none of them are Margo Hanson originals.”

And Q must be feeling very confident about all this, because he pulls his double-barrel hair tuck, lining up his kill shot. His hair fell out of its carefully crafted little bun hours ago, and it’s unspeakably charming.

“Okay,” he says. “Uh, counterpoint: those things would have been fun even if you weren’t doing all of them, all night, _with_ Margo Hanson, which you _did._ And second of all, uh, _most_ of all—” He has to take a breath. He’s cute. “—I don’t get why you’re so opposed in the first place, to something that’s literally so obvious everybody can see it, even me. I mean, you did _tequila shots_ with her, the whole thing, lime and salt and everything, and I know how you feel about—”

They’re at Q’s apartment building.

The walk’s not that far. Nothing in this neighborhood is _far,_ it would defeat the purpose if it was. But Q doesn’t notice; he’s too wrapped up in whatever argument he’s making, still talking about— jesus, what even is he talking about? About Margo, about Eliot, about some shit that definitely doesn’t matter. He blows straight past the gate, hands mid-impassioned-gesture, and it almost makes Eliot wish he was paying enough attention still to understand the point he’s making.

Almost.

Eliot catches him by the wrist. “Drop-off,” he says, and Q spins back toward him, adorably befuddled. “This is your stop, Q.”

Q’s attention snaps to the gate like he just noticed it. Maybe he did; he looks at it for what feels like a long time. “Oh, right,” he says. “Um, yeah. I guess so.”

Eliot leans over the fence to pop the latch. “Looks like we’ll have to table project ‘Resolved: Eliot and Margo should be BFFFs forever’ for now,” he says. “Happy to revisit at some point. How does ‘never’ work for you?”

He’s got a pretty good joke lined up, for when Q inevitably complains that ‘BFFF’ already has the word 'forever' in it. But instead of following the script, Q looks up at him, suddenly all frowny and pinched and thoughtful, and says: “Did you know that I’ve never seen you laugh that much before? Like, ever?”

And that’s— 

Eliot doesn’t know what to say to that.

He leans over again to nudge the gate open. “That sounds more to me,” he says, “like you could stand to update your material.”

Q’s not paying attention. Jesus, Eliot’s never known anyone who gets this _single-minded_ when they’re fucked up; even Gigi from undergrad could get distracted by a slice of pizza and a dildo. But Q just rolls forward on his toes and says, “Fork off.”

Well, Eliot can’t give him two passes in one night. What kind of message does that send? “You think I’m not serious about the language,” he says. “I want you to know that I’m _very_ serious. I’ll disown you, Coldwater.”

“You let Margo do it,” Q says.

“It’s sweet that you think I have any sway whatsoever over what that woman does with her mouth.”

“Oh, but you do when it’s me?”

“Hm.” Eliot touches his tongue thoughtfully to his lips. “Do I?”

Q hums like he’s thinking about it, but the edges of his mouth keep going alternately twisty and flat, fighting a smile in a way he almost never has to when he’s sober. “You’re an ash-hole,” he decides, and then he’s stretching his chin up, and his palm is against the back of Eliot’s neck. There’s a confusing, blurry shuffle of feet and noses and elbows, and then Q is kissing him.

It’s not— anything, really. It is what it is: an impulsive pop of affection, closed-mouthed and slightly off-center and… Eliot doesn’t know. Dry. Gentle. Like that’s normal, like it’s a thing people _do_ at whatever-o’clock in the fucking morning with the boy they brought home from the party, drunk and high and sensation-hungry.

There’s an animal part of Eliot’s brain urging him to- to bring it back down to Earth. To catch it, trap it, turn his head and escalate it into something sloppy and dirty and familiar. Truly, he wishes he could say the reason he doesn’t is that he’s finally mastered the art of not fucking everything up— but it’s actually just because the rest of his brain is too busy feeling _fucking insane_ to get on board in time.

It happens and then it’s over. It’s Q’s smile pressed up against his lips, and then it’s the warm puff of his breath, and then it’s the vibration of his soft, self-conscious laugh. “I’m, uh.” Q drops back down on his heels. “I’m _really_ drunk right now. Wow.”

He is. His hands grip hard at Eliot’s ribs, fingers clawing in the fabric of Eliot’s waistcoat like he’s trying to keep himself from pitching over.

“That’s okay,” Eliot says. “We’re not doing anything.”

Q squints at him. His eyes are glassy from drugs and alcohol and- whatever else, but they’re still— the way they always are. Intense, heavy, weighty; whatever you want to call the sensation that makes Eliot feel like he’s sinking chest-first to the bottom of the fucking ocean. 

“Aren’t we?” Q asks, voice low, and he’s close enough that it rumbles straight through Eliot’s sternum.

Jesus christ.

Eliot could fuck this up. He could fuck it up _so good,_ right here, right in the courtyard of Q’s twee little apartment building. He could satisfy the itch under his skin from the drugs, work out the last jittery dregs of his excess party energy, show Margo Hanson that he doesn’t need any _sugar_ to get this one to _go down_ for him.

Q’s forehead falls forward, against his shoulder. “I feel like we are,” he mumbles. “But— I dunno. Maybe I’m just being… me.”

Eliot doesn’t really know what that means. But he knows enough to pet one hand back over Q’s hair, to say glibly, “Are you asking me to tastefully fade to black with you?”

Q huffs a laugh into Eliot’s collar. Or— that’s what it sounds like, at first, to Eliot. It’s a laugh, and then it’s a hiccup, and then it’s… something else, something that comes in alongside a harsh, uneven breath, and Eliot’s fucked up brain genuinely can’t tell if it’s because of a positive emotion or a negative one.

Eliot tries to… help hold him up, maybe? He’s drunk, Q’s drunk, they’re both drunk and also high, so maybe that’s like a pool noodle trying to hold up another, smaller pool noodle, but they don’t fall over, at least. Eliot’s got one hand on Q’s waist, and the other around his elbow.

“Hey,” Eliot says, and then he remembers— earlier. By the lake. He never did ask, so: “You okay?”

He feels Q’s smile first, before he lifts his head. It’s encouraging, until Eliot actually gets a look at it, and then it’s— not. It _is_ a smile, technically, sure, but his eyes aren’t in it, and the whole thing is… not fake, but strained, like he’s feeling whatever he’s feeling in spite of himself. 

“Great,” Q says. “I’m, uh, actually kind of great? Is that bad?”

What the fuck?

Genuinely, Eliot is not equipped for this. Even if he weren’t blasted out of his mind, which he is, he would be— the last fucking person living or dead who should be handling whatever the fuck this situation is. “I mean,” he says slowly, “personally, I’d categorize it as _great,_ but to each their own, I guess.”

“It is great,” Q says. “It- It is. It is. I’m not— never mind.” He sighs, and it’s one of the bad ones. It’s harsh, and frustrated, like he’s giving up on something. “I’m not making any sense.”

Eliot can’t dispute it, because Q’s not even wrong. Eliot has no idea what the fuck is happening; he’s lost too much context to have any hope of keeping up now. The best he can do is tuck Q back into his chest, wrap him up, sway them a bit. Not too much. Just a pleasant ocean rock, the sweeter sister of the spins.

“Would it help,” he offers into Q’s hair, “if we made out a little?”

It nets the tremor of a laugh he’s angling for, Q tucking his face more firmly into the crook of Eliot’s neck. “Sure,” Q drawls, flat. “The, uh, participation trophy of drunken hookups. Great.”

“Excuse me?” Eliot says. “Are you suggesting that kissing only exists as a means to an end?”

Q’s face snaps up to him again. “No,” he says, transparently defensive. “I mean, not- not all the time. Obviously. But like— I mean, context is important, so—”

“Sure,” Eliot agrees. “Context.” He skims a few messy wisps of hair back from Q’s forehead and down behind his ear. “Say, for example, I come to find out that a dear friend of mine has apparently never been kissed properly in his life.” 

Q’s smile flickers and fades, quick amusement clouded by quick confusion. “Wait, are we—” His brow knits. He’s cute. “How- How serious are you being right now?”

That’s the question, isn’t it?

He’s got one hand curled around the back of Q’s neck already. That happened sort of by accident. It just fell there on its own, like that was the natural place for it. He finds that if he sweeps his thumb back and forth, just slowly, just once, he can catch the messy tangles in Q’s hair, the sharp edges of his stubble, the thump of his pulse. 

(It doesn’t seem smart, he thinks, that those are the things the afterlife decided to carry over: illusions of breath and blood, beards and messy buns, drugs and sweat and sex drives. 

He’s not _mad_ about it, it’s just, you know. Historically, not a list of things that have kept him on the path to God, or whatever.)

And Eliot is— _finessing_ this. But...

“Hm,” he decides, “middling to deathly, I think.”

Q’s eyes are dark, watching him. He licks his lips. “I thought you said we weren’t doing anything.”

“We’re not.” Eliot cants his weight forward, and Q’s face tips up to him, like it’s drawn on a string. “This doesn’t count. It’s like making out with the hot ghost that haunts your apartment.” He hums, tracing the lines of their noses together. “Was it all a dream? Did it really happen?”

“Okay, but are you the ghost in this scenario, because we’re both, like—”

Eliot catches _that_ little bit of fledgling morbidity before it can get off the ground. It melts away, when Eliot kisses him; _Q_ melts— and Eliot thinks bizarrely of cotton candy at the state fair, dissolving to tingling points of sweetness on his tongue.

And look, honestly, hand to heart, he was planning on leaving it there. One kiss, a sweet tease, just as plausibly deniable as the first. They’re both drunk, they’re both fucked up; one kiss gives Q something to think about, maybe fantasize about, and then decide on in the morning, once his head’s screwed on better. But Q—

Christ.

Q pulls back, but not away. He’s right there, his lips, his lashes, the soft, warm weight of him, and then he just breathes, “Oh.”

Eliot feels— insane. Buzzy and bright and hungry. “Yeah?” he breathes back, letting Q taste the edge of his smile.

“Yeah,” Q says. “Yeah, yes, um—” and then he’s gripping, tugging, pulling, _dragging_ Eliot back in against him, even though Eliot is literally right there already, _jesus._

It’s exactly how Eliot pictured it’d be. Or, okay, not _exactly,_ but close, close enough. Q doesn’t hold anything back. He’s like— a raw fucking bruise, radiating heat and bleeding sensation to the point of biting, delicious pain. He doesn’t seem to realize that he can do anything else with his hands besides clutch the front of Eliot’s shirt, so he just keeps doing that, over and over: his collar, his lapels, the tops and backs of his sleeves. 

Eliot gets both hands around Q’s face, back into his hair, and— jesus. Fuck. This was such a good idea. Fuck whatever he was saying before, Eliot’s a fucking genius.

He doesn’t go far, when they break apart again. Just far enough so that he can watch Q’s lashes flutter open, feel the quick intake of his breath. “Full points for participation,” Eliot murmurs into the space between their lips. “Did you want your trophy gold-dipped or gold-plated?”

He can feel Q’s baffled little frown, this close. He’s cute. “I’m—” One of his hands slides back and down, curls loosely into the small of Eliot’s back. His skin is warm, even through the fabric of all Eliot’s layers. “What?”

“Mm,” Eliot says, stroking his thumb along Q’s cheekbone, “exactly.”

And that’s— where this needs to stop. For now.

He’s finessing this. Staying ahead of it. Keeping control of it. There’s no rush, no reason to not let out some slack in the line. There’s a lot at stake here, technically, maybe, and Eliot doesn’t exactly have the most sterling track record. Ergo, tapping the brakes.

Besides, it’ll make it that much better once he finally _does_ get Q’s pretty dick in his mouth. 

“Get some sleep,” he says. He pulls back, but Q isn’t— his hand is still there, tucked against the curve of Eliot’s spine. “I need you battle-ready again by morning, so you should get your hours in while you can.”

Q’s frown softens into an almost-there smile. “You said before, um.” The tip of his tongue peeks out from the corner of his mouth, where the skin is flushed and red. Jesus. “You said I could have tomorrow off.” 

That, tragically, is true. Eliot tips his face up to the sky. “Does it ever get tiring, being such a steel trap all the time?” he sighs. “Fine. I suppose I’ll allow it.”

Quentin still doesn’t let him go.

His eyes are wide and dark and searching. He’s not— really reading the room, here. But he’s drunk, it’s been an eventful night, Eliot is a good kisser. A certain level of dreamy daze is understandable. Inevitable, even. 

“Um, so,” Quentin says. “I’ll talk to you later?” His grip at Eliot’s back tightens, reflexive, and Eliot— feels it again. That rabbit-fast pulse, throbbing in his ears. “We- We’ll talk. Later.”

“Yeah,” Eliot says. He’s not sure yet if he’s lying or not. “Sure, Q.”

Quentin nods once, hesitant, and then again, like he’s talking himself around. “Okay,” he says. “Uh- cool.” _Cool,_ indeed. He’s cute. “Then, um— Goodnight.”

This time when Eliot steps back, Quentin lets his hand slip away.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there! Long time. I won't keep you, but I do want to say that if you're still hanging with me on this one, you're a gift and I appreciate you very, very much.

Janet indulges him an afternoon of fanciful experiments with colored reflecting pools in the backyard. Eliot’s half-sure he hates them already; they’re just the latest in a string of failed rough drafts, barely any better than yesterday’s fountain debacle, but he’s closer. He thinks. Maybe. Hopefully.

“What do you think of the magenta?” he asks. “Strikes one as a little entry-level warehouse rave, no?”

To be fair to Janet, she doesn’t really do ‘opinions.’ She’s got more of a ‘host at Wednesday night Trivia’ vibe going for her; when he asked what she thought of having one reflecting pool that wrapped around the perimeter of the yard, she’d told him that the longest lazy river in across-the-universe existence was in Waco, Texas. But that decision had also basically made itself after that, so… in a way, Janet’s opinion is the only one that matters.

She doesn’t answer right away, this time. When he turns around, she has her head tilted back, smiling beatifically at the sky.

“Janet?”

Her chin snaps down. She smiles at him, brilliant and dazzling, and says, “Oops!”

In the space of time it takes him to complete the round-trip thought, _What the fuck?_ Janet has raised a single imploring finger at him, disappeared, and then reappeared in the exact same spot. “Quentin wants you to know that he’s at your front door,” she tells him. “Also, magenta doesn’t technically exist.”

 _What_ the _fuck?_

“What?” Eliot says.

“It’s a construction of the human mind,” she explains. 

“No, _what?_ ” Eliot says again. She opens her mouth to answer, and he can’t— This is going to give him a fucking migrane. “Okay, stop. Back up. One thing at a time.” Breathe. He can hear fucking Natalie in his head already, hands folded under her chin, _Anjali mudra, Eliot._ “Quentin is where?”

Janet doesn’t even blink. “At your front door,” she answers. “He’s rung the doorbell thirteen times.” She tilts her head, and then smiles again. “Fourteen times!”

“Jesus,” Eliot says. “Fine. Okay.” He points at her while he cuts across the yard. He’s just in his shirtsleeves, he needs to— His cardigan is on the patio chair. “We’re not done here. Hold that thought.”

“I will,” she assures him cheerfully, while he’s shoving one hand into a sleeve and passing the other over his hair. “I hold all thoughts, for all time!” Which, alright, fine, Eliot guesses he knew that already.

He catches himself at the sliding glass door, hand already halfway to the handle. There’s a glare on the glass from the sun, hanging high behind him in the early afternoon, and it throws his reflection into sharper relief than he really needs right now.

(His hair _is_ perfect, though, thank god; if there’s any evidence in favor of fake-out Heaven being actual Heaven, it’s the great, omnipotent middle finger being given to ambient humidity.)

He rolls his shoulders up, back, and down. He takes a breath, gets a fucking grip. _Anjali mudra, Eliot._

Moment of truth. So to speak.

He ditches the sliding glass door plan. Too easy, too obvious. He cuts the long way around to the front yard instead, where he can get an early angle on the porch; early enough to witness Quentin ringing the doorbell a fifteenth time, an impatient, one-fingered jab that has to be more for the emotional catharsis than for actually getting anyone’s attention. 

“Fifteen!” Eliot hears Janet report brightly behind him, alone in the backyard.

Quentin has his heavy bag of books on him, and he’s back in flannel for today’s flirtation with fall; deep blue, this time, with threads of red and purple. He fidgets on Eliot’s doorstep, hair loose and chin tucked in toward his chest. Eliot can’t get a read on his face, but Quentin keeps picking at the seam on the front pocket of his jeans, the way he does when he wants to look casual but doesn’t feel it, and has decided to go all method about it.

Eliot posts up against the side of the house, as languorous a one-shouldered lean as he can manage in the spare few seconds he has to his advantage. He flicks stray ends of his hair out of his eyes, pops his right foot behind his left, and calls, “Yoohoo.”

Quentin’s shoulders snap to his ears. He twists around, both hands tangled up in the strap of his messenger bag, and, well. Eliot can definitely see his face now. He doesn’t look _mad,_ per se. Determined, maybe. Resolute. 

And, okay, a little mad.

“Hi,” Eliot says. “Can I help you, sir?”

Quentin looks at him, and then at the door, and then back at him again. “Have you been back there this whole time?”

“It’s my house,” Eliot says. He chooses not to engage with the pinched, baffled look Quentin shoots back at him. “Look, feel free to stay and chat if you want, happy to have you, but I’ve actually got kind of an extensive to-do list.” He turns around and flutters one hand back over his shoulder. “Come with me, please.”

“Hang on,” Quentin calls behind him. Eliot can hear him clattering down the veranda’s front steps to the yard. “Eliot—”

“FYI, you interrupted mine and Janet’s creative flow,” Eliot says over his shoulder. “Just as an observation.”

Quentin only follows him to the edge of the patio. He stops there, not sitting, not shedding his bag, arms stiff. His eyes dart across the yard; Eliot half-wishes he’d gotten a bit further along before now, to at least have something cohesive— if maybe not _impressive_ — to show off, but c’est la vie. Fraught is the creative process.

“Hi there!” Janet chirps. She’s still in the exact same spot she was before, still with her hands folded primly in front of her.

Quentin is, apparently, not also mad at Janet. “Hi,” he says politely, “uh, again, Janet. Thanks for getting him for me.”

“What exactly is the urgency here?” Eliot asks. “Swans swimming out of formation? Apple orchard accidentally produced golden delicious instead of granny smith?”

Quentin literally says the actual sounds, “Ha ha,” like they’re individual words, so this is already going worse than Eliot expected it to, and that particular bar was on the floor. He chances a glance over, but Quentin is still staring— maybe now _glaring_ — at the yard. “It’s not ‘urgent,’” Quentin says. “I just- it’s been a couple days. Even Sascha said he hadn’t seen you.” 

“Sascha needs to learn about boundaries,” Eliot says. “But you’re here now, so I’m open to your input on the flow of the space.” He gets a fresh look at the reflecting pools as he steps out into the grass, and decides he was right about the magenta. It’s juvenile; he’s better than this. “Keep in mind, it’s a work in progress.”

Quentin stays where he is. “This is what you’ve been doing?” he asks, after a moment. “Party planning?”

“Never mind,” Eliot says, as airily as he can manage, to cut some of this— whatever, energy. “I won’t be needing your input after all.”

It doesn’t work. Quentin doesn’t smile, not even in his long-suffering, humoring sort of way. “I mean, I’m just saying,” he says, sounding very much like he’s not _just_ saying, “I remember you insisting that we couldn’t wait even _one more day_ —”

“Honestly, Q.”

“—otherwise it would compromise the integrity of the whole, uh, _quote,_ ‘mission.’ Are you just over Margo Hanson now?”

“The game is evolving,” Eliot answers. “I need you to keep up.”

Quentin’s brows shoot up. “Is that supposed to be a joke?”

And, like, _jesus._ Okay. This is unravelling fast. 

It occurs, maybe later than it should have, that the script Eliot’s used to following in situations like this— which mostly involve fuckboys he met in basements while blackout— might not, in fact, apply when the boy in question is… well. Not that. And Eliot’s not _trying_ to be an asshole; he could if he wanted, and he isn’t. He just— it’s a tightrope he hasn’t walked in a while. And by _while,_ he should probably say _ever._

“I might,” he starts again, carefully and (god) honestly, “be experiencing an itty-bitty spate of creative block.” Quentin keeps staring at him, jaw still tense, but something expression— gives, a little. Eliot’s not too proud to accept pity. “I could use a second pair of eyes. Janet does her best, but.”

He holds one hand out. Janet says, “Did you know that magenta doesn’t technically exist?”

Quentin’s eyes dart away, but not before there’s a twitch at the corner of his mouth, one he pulls flat before it can turn into anything else. “Right,” he says, and if it takes Janet doing what Eliot can’t, so be it.

“I’m making Kentucky mules,” Eliot offers. “If you’ve got an hour or two?”

Quentin wants to argue. He tries to argue. But pity is a powerful thing; he ducks his head and scuffs his feet, and then scrubs both hands over his face and back into his hair in a show of performative frustration. “Fine,” he says finally, “if you— fine,” and he doesn’t look… _not_ mad now, necessarily, but he hoists his bag up and off his shoulder. He sits, and he accepts the hammered copper mug Eliot passes over to him.

“Great.” Eliot perches back on the chaise he dragged out to the head of the yard. “Janet. Reset, please, and we can walk Q through it from the beginning.”

  


* * *

  


Eliot’s not _ignoring_ it. He’s not. He’s— finessing.

Quentin gets too in his head over things. He cooks up his own worst case scenarios, and then he sticks them at the ends of railway tunnels and calls them oncoming trains. Case in point: Eliot’s sure Quentin _thinks_ he’s ignoring it, when he isn’t. Obviously.

There’s a point of no return here, that’s all. You don’t recover from putting your dick in someone, Eliot knows that from experience. Once they cross that line, they’ll either stick the _with benefits_ landing, or they very much won’t. 

All Eliot’s doing is… resurfacing the ice. Making sure they get the best shot at this they can get.

That’s all.

  


* * *

  


“I guess I just don’t really know what you want from me,” Quentin says sourly. Which is, you know: case in point. He’s not being as cute as he thinks he is, and Eliot doesn’t engage with passive aggression.

“It’s easy,” he says. “Just stand—” Quentin allows himself to be steered across the grass, palm-to-shoulder, which Eliot is choosing to take as a good sign. “—here. And tell me how you feel.” Yikes. No. “Tell me how the space _makes_ you feel.”

Quentin does, at least, look. And think. Or, he stands quietly for a few seconds _like_ he’s looking and thinking about the space.

“Uh, it’s creepy?” he says eventually. “It _makes_ me feel weird.”

So, off to a great start.

“Maybe elaborate on that for me?” Eliot says.

“I feel like I’m in—” Quentin twists around, eyes wide, and just for a second, blink-and-you-miss-it, the prickly façade falls away. “ _Oh,_ you know that scene in, uh, Temple of Doom? The, uh— you know.” He punches the air with his right hand. “It reminds me of that.”

Eliot does not know. “Yeah. That doesn’t help me even a little bit.”

Quentin stares at him. “Are you kidding?” He seems genuinely annoyed, only now for a different reason than he was already. “It’s an iconic scene. The special effects alone.”

“I assume from context it’s…” Eliot has no idea. “... Lord of the Rings?”

Q’s jaw drops, so maybe not Lord of the Rings. “Is this— are you making fun of me right now? Or are you being serious?”

“My second guess was Harry Potter. Is it the thing with the snake? That didn’t sound right to me, but—”

“Oh my god, stop,” Quentin says. “No. It’s Indiana Jones, how do you not know this?”

Eliot snaps his fingers. “No, no, you’re right, I should have known. You’ve got Harrison Ford on the brain, makes sense.”

Q’s neck flushes pink, which is interesting. “No, I don’t. What do you… What’s that even mean, ‘on the brain’? I didn’t even mention him.”

And it takes Eliot all the way up until this point— poised on the edge of, _Don’t you remember, we were talking about Star Wars until you were blue in the face,_ just to stoke the fire for the fun of it, ready to soak up a new wave of Q’s rambling indignation— to realize he’s got his foot over the plate of a bear trap. 

_“Oh,”_ he can already hear Quentin saying, lobbing for new heights of passive-aggressive snottiness, _“so now you’re saying the other night did happen, actually?”_

Eliot pivots neatly, says, “Just another lens through which to appreciate you, Q,” instead, and Quentin snorts, twisting back around to the yard. “Come on, tell me about the doom. Paint me a word picture. Maybe it’s what I’m going for, I haven’t decided.”

It’s foolproof, honestly. Quentin sighs like he’s being asked to recite a book report, but they both know good and well he’d never be able to resist a meaty book report. “So it’s, like, there’s this cult, right, and—”

Anyway. Short story shorter, two drinks and twenty minutes of comparing Eliot to a bloodthirsty cult leader seems to take some of the edge off of Quentin’s mood. (Eliot likes to think maybe the reliability of their established rapport has something to do with it too, but, you know. He’ll take his small victories where he can get them.) Apparently the yard does not _literally_ look like a secret chamber inside a mountain where a special effects team from the 80s made ripping a man’s heart out of his chest look very convincing, but it does have the unfortunate _vibe_ of one, somehow.

Eliot makes them another round of drinks while Quentin tries to puzzle his way through it. The mules are starting to bore him, if he’s being honest; he picks out the gin from his bar cart, and the champagne, and the peach nectar.

“It’s too dramatic,” Quentin says. He’s relaxed enough now that he’s melted down onto one of the long patio lounge chairs, his right ankle dangling off the edge. His empty copper mug is carefully balanced on his belly. “I think that’s what it is. Like you’re trying to go big, and that’s— it’s fine, but it’s not the main draw, you know? At least, it isn’t for me.”

“No?” Eliot piles ice into his shaker. “Am I about to hear the Coldwater-Waugh origin story? The _je ne sais quoi_ that enticed you to my party, that fateful night?”

“Can you not?” Quentin complains. He tips his head back to glare at Eliot upside-down, but he gives the game away with how warm his eyes are. “I’m trying to give you a, whatever, a constructive compliment.”

“No, please,” Eliot says. “If we’re talking compliments, then I’m all ears.”

“You don’t have to out-flair Margo, is what I’m saying,” Quentin says. “All of this, it’s like.” He flaps his free hand at the yard without looking. “I dunno, it just feels like you’re trying to one-up her. And, I mean, sure, you probably could.” He lifts his eyebrows, imploring even upside-down. “But why would you, you know?”

Eliot passes the drink down to him. “Okay,” is all he can think to say. “This is a compliment?”

“It’s supposed to be.”

“Okay,” Eliot says again. “Maybe we should revisit the definition of a compliment, then.”

“It’s not clicking because you’re putting this on Margo’s terms, even though your, like, base formula is better than hers,” Quentin says. “It’s a _constructive_ compliment.”

Constructive or not, Eliot thinks that’s probably a leap. “First of all, nothing about what I do is formulaic,” he says. Quentin rolls his eyes, and slurps his drink from the edge of his glass. “Second of all, I recall a certain someone having _quite_ the time—”

“Did you change this?” Quentin asks.

“What?” Eliot says.

“The drink.” Q tips his chin down to peer into the mouth of the glass, like that would tell him anything Eliot couldn’t. “This drink. Did you change it again?”

“Oh.” Yes, actually; he started muddling some mint in with the nectar instead of just leaving it as a garnish. But Eliot hadn’t— He needs a second to process this aggressive a topic-change. “Not a lot. I’m surprised you noticed.”

Q frowns at his glass. “Well, I mean,” he says. “It’s kind of what I’m talking about, right? This is the part Margo doesn’t do. You know, the- the details, like that.” Also a leap, in Eliot’s opinion. “Because if you spend all this time super, like- zoomed out, top-down, big-picture, or whatever, you have to accept that you’re going to lose out on a lot of the nuance going on right in front of you. Like, uh.” He looks up, and his smile is cautious and small. “Maybe you end up accidentally creating a ritualistic sacrifice kinda vibe instead of… you know. Whatever you were going for.”

 _”Um, so,”_ says the Quentin in Eliot’s head, relentlessly opportunistic. _”Speaking of, that reminds me, I wanted to talk to you about—”_

“Um,” real-life-Quentin says, “so…”

“Let’s say you’re onto something,” Eliot interrupts, “the fact remains that I can’t just keep retreading the same territory here, Q,” and he’s not— ignoring it. He’s not. They’ll get there eventually; in the meantime, he’s steering the ship. Tapping them back on track. Resurfacing the ice.

Quentin doesn’t look upset when he says, “Yeah, uh, I wasn’t really worried about that,” but he does look away when he says it, his hair obscuring the lines of his face, and Eliot’s not sure he likes that any better.

  


* * *

  


Realistically, though, Eliot was only ever going to be able to steer so much, with Quentin white-knuckled on the wheel the way he is. 

They get a firepit going when the light starts to get thin. Eliot’s not sold yet on having it be a permanent fixture— he’ll take ritual sacrifice vibes over last-night-at-summer-camp-and-we’re-both-still-virgins vibes, thanks— but Quentin insists.

“You never know, maybe it’ll help,” he says. He’s curled up lengthwise on Eliot’s chevron bench with his glass tucked between his knees, watching Eliot stoke the fire. “It’s warm. It’s, uh, welcoming. Right? I don’t know, drunk people love bonfires.”

“Yes,” Eliot says, dropping into one of the opposite chairs, “and we can all play a slightly different variant of Shoulders and then argue for twenty minutes about what the real rules are.”

Quentin frowns, already thinking about it. “You go around in a circle and try to mess people up,” he says. “How else would you play Shoulders?”

“It doesn’t matter, Q,” Eliot tells him sweetly. “We’ll play Shoulders over the last wretched gasp of my tortured eternal soul.”

He catches snapshot edges of Q’s smile through the flickering shadows on his face. “I dunno,” he says. “You think that’s dramatic enough?”

“Probably not,” Eliot admits. “This go at the afterlife does seem a little too evolved for that. I might have to chip in for my own torture. Maybe give myself a few good turns at _The Cycle Path._ ”

“Oh, well, now we know you’re serious.”

And it’s easy, is the thing. 

They’ve basically turned the whole situation from earlier around, brought themselves back to their comfortable baseline, and it feels— good. You could bottle this exact moment, he thinks. Make a froyo flavor out of it. _Comfortable silence with the friend you made out with that one time, while also slightly buzzed._ They could just stay here, let it exist in this electric, enticing hypothetical space, and maybe that wouldn’t be Eliot’s _ideal,_ sure, but... there’s something deliciously Victorian about _wanting,_ isn’t there? And that way it never gets— you know, whatever. Sideways.

Quentin shifts in his seat. His face drops into shadow when he looks down at his lap. “Um,” he starts, both hands wrapped so far around his glass his fingers have laced, “so.”

The fire pops. Eliot needs a drink.

“I’m kinda tipsy, I guess,” Quentin says. “So I’m— you know. I get that saying this is probably a bad idea, but I’m... gonna.”

Eliot pushes himself out of his chair. “Okay.”

“And I want you to know, I’m not even, like… I’m not trying to- _do_ anything,” Quentin says, instead of saying whatever he’s supposed to be saying. “I just- I want to get it out there. Right? I kind of thought that you— um, but it doesn’t actually matter what I thought. That’s- That’s the point.”

Eliot picks the bourbon off the bar cart again. Neat. Back in the good ol’ days, his stomach probably would’ve had thoughts about all the flip-flopping he’s been doing this afternoon, dark to clear and back to dark again, mixers and no mixers, a brief but significant wine detour— but luckily for him, his stomach doesn’t get a say in much of anything anymore. “Sure.”

“For the record,” Quentin says, “I wanted to say something earlier. I was going to, when you answered the door. I had a whole, like— speech planned.” He sounds annoyed about it, like Eliot deprived him of some kind of comeuppance _moment._ “But you didn’t answer the door, and then there was the whole thing with Margo, or whatever, and… I don’t know.”

“Be the wrench you want to see,” Eliot offers over his shoulder. 

He can say that, because Quentin’s not actually listening. Not really. He’s on his own wavelength, single-minded to and beyond the fucking grave. “I don’t know,” he says again. “I thought it was weird.” Eliot hears him shift, and the bench creak. Probably he’s tucking his legs underneath him. Just one leg, maybe, the other dropping down to the patio tiles. “Is it, like, weird now? Between you and me?”

So. They’re doing this.

“Do you think it’s weird?” Eliot returns, as he turns back around.

It wins him an exasperated look, shot over the fire and then darting away again. Quentin is, as suspected, sitting like he’s never sat down before in his life: one foot on the patio and the other tucked under his opposite thigh. “Do _I?_ ” he repeats. “I mean, I don’t know, El. You’re the one who’s been, like— hiding out, back here. What am I supposed to think?”

“Whatever you want, presumably,” Eliot says, and Quentin snorts, reaching up to rub at the space between his eyes. “I got busy. It’s not deep, Q.”

“Right, but—”

“You think if I had any qualms about having you around, you wouldn’t know about it?”

“I know, but—”

Eliot sits down beside him on the bench, and Quentin actually jumps, a drink-sloppy little jerk in his seat. He’s so on-edge. He won’t look at Eliot at all, stiff and still, staring straight forward. “But?”

“I don’t know, Eliot,” Quentin says again, and this time the extra syllables sound like a reprimand. As if Eliot’s got something to answer for, which he doesn’t. Obviously. “ _This,_ like… it’s weird, right? We’re literally talking about it right now, and we’re still not even really talking about it.” He flings one frustrated hand out between them, and then immediately tucks it back under his thigh. “I just, I obviously have my perspective, and you have yours, and I get that just because I think something is, you know... whatever, that doesn’t mean you do, too. So if I made you uncomfortable, or- or if I crossed a line, or something, then that’s— I don’t want that. I don’t— um. You’re my friend. So.”

That must be the speech, or what’s left of it, because he tucks his hair behind his right ear and glares away from the fire, into the darkness. There’s a few long seconds where it’s just that: the fire, the crickets that apparently exist exclusively for ambience, the tense hunch of Quentin’s shoulders, and the gap between them on the bench.

It’s a little dramatic, even by Eliot’s standards. If they’re going to do this, there’s no reason it can’t just be simple. But Quentin’s not built for that, is he? 

That’s fine. Eliot is. He’s about as layered as tissue paper.

He sets his glass down on the side table. “You’re overthinking this.”

Quentin makes a sound that’s too derisive to be a laugh. “I mean, _yeah,_ probably.” His hair falls right back out of place when he turns his head. It’s ridiculous, honestly, the kind of setups he lays down without even trying. “Which is why I’m even doing this in the first place, if you would just— I don’t know, give me _something._ ”

Eliot lets his hand come up: lazy, casual, easy. He tucks the stray lock back where it belongs, right behind the curve of Q’s ear. He lets his thumb skim down, traces the line down from Q’s jaw to his throat, and considers the way Q goes very still under his fingertips a job very, very well done.

Q takes a quick, sharp breath. “Um.” His pulse flutters. “El.”

“Mm.” Eliot draws his thumb around the shell of Q’s ear, just to watch the darks of his eyes go even darker. “I think I know how to save us both some time, if it’s all the same to you.”

Q’s brow furrows, frustrated little frown lines. He’s cute. “I wouldn’t say it’s- all the same,” he says. Eliot watches his throat bob, slow and delicious. “I mean, I thought—”

“ _Over_ thinking,” Eliot reminds him. “Relax.” He tilts his head, draws their noses together. “Let’s not talk.”

It’s a very innocent start; Q makes a soft, disgruntled sound, but he still leans into the touch, still lets his lips part, still lingers in that moment of shared breath— and then he’s twisting abruptly away, grunting, “God, just,” his glass clattering when he leans over to drop it on the ground next to the bench. He says, “Um,” and then he’s sitting back up, pressing back in, both hands winding around Eliot’s jaw, kissing hot and hungry and deep.

It’s a little too much a little too fast, a Coldwater classic, and fuck— _perfect._ Eliot lets himself be dragged into the metaphorical undertow of Q’s nervous energy, and the literal undertow of his reaching, grasping hands. “Relax,” he chides again, when Q accidentally clips his shoulder trying to get back into his hair. He smooths his palm over Q’s knuckles, guides them both back to lace their fingers together through his curls. “We’re relaxing, yeah?”

Q snorts a tiny, incredulous laugh, right up against his lips. “Yeah,” he says, “uh, if that’s what you’re waiting for, then— Neither of us has that kind of time, I don’t think.”

“I mean, eternity.”

He feels it, how Q’s smile blooms. “Uh-huh,” he murmurs, over rumbling laughter. “That’s- That’s the joke, yeah.” He takes a quick, nipping kiss. “Thanks.”

They crowd up together against the deepest corner of the bench, all misplaced elbows and uncomfortable angles, and Eliot feels— insane, suddenly, with how urgently he needs to— he doesn’t even know. They’re outside, on the fucking backyard patio of the goddamn _house_ that has Eliot’s last name hanging by the front door, half in the oppressive heat of the fire and half in the minor-key chill of the night. It’s so fucking weird, and _so_ fucking good. 

Eliot lets his hand snake down into the space between them, lets the heel of his palm hang heavy and suggestive over the ridge of Q’s belt buckle, and Q makes this— fucking _sound_ that’s half a gasp, half a groan, and half a word, and Eliot _can_ do math, thanks for fucking asking, it’s just that— it does. It spills over, exactly like that, exactly the way Q always does, in everything he does. His messy buns, and his garden-path explanations, and all the crumbs he leaves behind on Eliot’s window seat. The boundaries of his stubble, the hems of his clothes. His eyes, his attention, his enthusiasm. All of it spilling over, until it makes Eliot want to get on his knees and drink up the excess. 

“Upstairs,” Q mumbles urgently against his mouth. “Should we— Upstairs?”

 _Fuck yes,_ Eliot thinks, at the same time he thinks, _Fuck no._

They’d complement each other so well, Eliot’s dark burgundy sheets and Q’s warm golden undertones. Eliot could bully him down to the bed, flat on his back to get the best contrast, work his cock until his head rocks back, neck long and chin sharp and hair fanned out on the silk pillow. Jesus, Eliot thinks he could get off on the aesthetic alone if he tried hard enough; sit back on his heels and just _look._

But, he’s— 

Right. 

He’s being careful. That’s two doors and a staircase of logistics, and there’s still room here for him to fuck this up. Maybe he forgot that for a second, but he remembers now, and now he is going to _stick_ this goddamn landing, because there’s no fucking world anymore where he’d be satisfied only doing this once. 

“What for?” Eliot wonders into the crook of Quentin’s throat. “I’ve got everything I’m looking for right here.” He skims his lips down— slow enough to soak up every vibration of Quentin’s answering moan, which is an interesting detail, to be revisited— down, down, down, until the ridges of the patio tiles bite his skin through his slacks, as he sinks from the bench to his knees.

“Oh,” Quentin breathes. 

He’s so pliable now, eyes wide and mouth red. His knees open so easily when Eliot slides his hands between them.

“Hi.” He smooths his palms up Quentin’s thighs and back down again. “Thoughts?”

Quentin stares at him. The fire crackles. 

“You’re too tall,” he says.

Eliot tugs the tail of Quentin’s belt out of its buckle. “Mm?”

“You’ll—” Quentin’s throat trembles and bobs, eyes caught on Eliot’s hands as he draws the belt back, pops the pin, and slides it free. “You’ll get a- a crick in your neck.”

Eliot smooths one hand thoughtfully over the front of Quentin’s fly, palm molding around the half-hard length of him, and languishes in the punched-out sigh he gets for his trouble. “That’s a good point,” he says. He thumbs the button open, lets his fingers take the zipper notch by thoughtful notch. “Maybe I should think it over a bit more. Weigh my options.”

Quentin actually _bites his fucking lip,_ jesus christ. “Well, I mean,” he says, too shaky to be smooth. “I mean, sure, but. You’re gonna.”

Eliot slides both hands up and back, to hook into both waistbands of Quentin’s pants and boxers. Quentin takes the hint and lifts his hips, eyes squeezing shut tight. “You know,” Eliot muses, peeling fabric out of his way. “You’re right. I am gonna.” 

And he _is_ gonna, shifting up and forward on his knees, right hand splayed over Quentin’s hip, head bowing low, when the heel of Quentin’s hand catches him at the shoulder, holding him off.

“Wait,” he gasps, “wait, wait—” and honestly, Eliot might start having real concerns if not for how black Quentin’s eyes are when he opens them. “Shouldn’t we… I mean…” His mouth is hanging open, gears whirring, and then he just says, “Condom?”

Which is— 

Okay.

“Okay,” Eliot says slowly, letting his thumb slide along the groove of Quentin’s hip. “Can you explicate for me what, exactly, you think might happen if we _didn’t_ use a condom?”

Quentin lets his head drop back against the bench’s back cushion. “STD,” he mutters, dazed and mournful, “but, like, for your soul? How should I know.”

Eliot turns his nose down against the inside of Quentin’s thigh.

“Don’t laugh,” Q complains. “My best friend talked my ear off about safe sex for, like, three weeks straight in ninth grade. It’s- It’s ingrained. That’s not a bad thing.”

“I’m not laughing.”

“Your face is like two inches from my- my—” He stalls out trying to find a rating-appropriate word. He cuffs his hand against the side of Eliot’s head instead, but then it just stays there, curled gently into his hair. “I can _feel_ you laughing, Eliot.”

“It’s sweet,” Eliot assures him. “I appreciate your interest in the sexual health of my eternal soul.”

Q smiles at him, wry and embarrassed and, yes, sweet. “Uh, but also.” His thumb rubs restlessly in the dip behind Eliot’s ear. “Clean-up is probably still a thing, even here.”

Eliot lets himself grin, angles it up through his lashes. “Baby,” he says, letting it roll as deep and low in his chest as it wants. “Not with me it’s not.”

He shifts up and forward on his knees, curls his nails into the skin of Quentin’s hip, and bows his head low.

He was right, before: it’s _so_ worth the buildup, for the moment he gets Quentin’s pretty dick in his mouth. Quentin makes a sound like he’s being hooked behind the sternum, “ _Oh,_ ” and then gasps harshly out, “uh, _god,_ ” hands scrabbling against Eliot’s shoulders, all before Eliot has even finished his introductory turn.

(Men can be so boring, sometimes. They treat stoicism against pleasure like it’s a personality trait, like it’s supposed to be fun for Eliot to have to work for it. And sometimes it _is_ fun, don’t get him wrong— making a lax bro cry in a hotel bathroom is some of the most fun he’s ever had in his life, easy top five, can’t recommend enough— but _god_ is it boring, when it isn’t.)

Q bottles himself up so much— but not here, not like this, laid out under Eliot’s hands and mouth and attention. Eliot is starting to suspect that once that stopper comes out, there’s no putting it back in; Q’s quick, startled breaths in become slow, trembling sighs out, then melt into hums, into moans, into, “God,” into, "El," into, “ _Eliot._ ” He whines and he squirms and he gasps, “Jesus, sorry,” each time his hips lift off the bench in little hitches. 

He gets handsy when he’s close, which by itself isn’t that noteworthy; Eliot’s used to flavors of that already, knows to look for hands on his neck to hold him still, or a palm on the crown of his head to shove him down. And Q _is_ some of that, he’s as much a college boy with a few ounces of liquor in him as anyone could expect him to be, fingers twisting deep and needy and thoughtless into the closest soft surface he can reach, but he’s also— well. You know, he’s Q. 

“F—” He bites down hard on the fricative, flattens it out into a moan. “Sorry, sorry,” he gasps, “I know we- we haven’t talked about, like- um—” He winds his fingers out of Eliot’s hair, smooths his palm against Eliot’s temple, like Eliot’s a cat he’s disrespected. “I didn’t mean to- _oh,_ f—” 

Eliot pulls off just long enough to say, “If you invoke cutlery right now I will never speak to you again,” as seriously as he can manage while his throat is all cock-raspy, and also while he’s still making full eye-contact with the cock in question.

Q chokes on his own breathless laughter. He throws his head back, one hand flying up to scrub at his eyes. “Oh my god,” he gasps at the sky, and he’s— cute, he’s so— “I am _trying._ ”

“Just letting you know,” Eliot says, and drops his jaw again.

“You have no idea,” Q goes on, gasping and panting, because of course he does, “how hard it is to- to- _ah,_ to concentrate on- on—” Eliot takes the opportunity to slide down to the base, to feel the drag across his soft palate, just to hear the semi-coherence of Q’s thought totally fall apart. “Oh f— _god,_ oh my god, _Eliot._ ” 

Eliot thinks _yes_ like a crackling bolt of electricity, feels it from the top of his head to the base of his gut, _yes that more now._ He hums so that Q can feel it, a luxurious vibration in his throat, low and long and suffused with pleasure— and Q’s fingers go vice-tight in his hair all over again. 

“I’m gonna,” he gasps, grasping, pulling, twisting, releasing. “ _Sorry,_ oh my god, I— El, I’m gonna—”

And it’s fine. It’s fine, because Eliot wants it now, wants it so bad he’s literally choking on it now, would be so disappointed if he didn’t get it after all of this, and he’d tell Q that if it wouldn’t totally defeat the purpose, right, so he stays where he is, stays with what he knows works, Eliot Waugh dead and gone and still on his knees (ha!), because that way he knows he’ll get every drop, and he _is_ still thinking about swallowing come (right?), probably, he doesn’t know what else he’d- he’d— 

When Q comes, it’s the quietest he’s been the whole time; it’s a shudder, a whimper, his hands petting through Eliot’s hair, restless and soothing, and done.

That’s all there is to it. No clean-up necessary.

Q has gone liquid against the bench. He must have slid almost halfway down, his head propped at what looks like an uncomfortable angle against the cushion. “Jesus.” The fire flickers against the dark of his eyes when they dart down to watch Eliot swipe his thumb at the corner of his mouth. “Jesus, I...” 

“Has yet to make an appearance, actually,” Eliot muses, sitting back on his heels to stretch out his spine. He does have a crick in his neck. “Maybe now we know why.”

Q snorts, a surprised, helpless little giggle. “Oh my god,” he says, and he’s sitting up, leaning forward, cupping Eliot’s jaw in one hand, “stop talking.”

And it’s not that Eliot is— _surprised,_ precisely. It’s a mixed bag, obviously, everyone has preferences or whatever, but he’s been with plenty of men before who didn’t mind kissing after oral. He’s even been with a handful who _insisted_ on kissing after, where that was half the draw. It’s not that weird. But it’s still… something, the way Quentin kisses him now. Hard and deep and— sweet, and smiling, with his cock still out, his jeans still pooled around his ankles. 

“That good, huh,” Eliot murmurs, mostly because he doesn’t trust his voice with anything more ambitious than that. He’s trying to keep it together, but already he feels lit up from the inside out, suffocating in all his layers, when he just wants— 

Q laughs, throaty and full. “Uh, _yeah,_ ” he says. “If you want to win an award for, like, understatement of the year, then yeah. It was pretty good.” He noses in close, his palms wide on Eliot’s ribs, his breath hot on Eliot’s skin. “Can I…” 

“Yup,” Eliot manages, resolve splintering on the spot. “Mmhm. Yep. Feel free to,” he nearly chokes on his own moan, when Q twists to kiss him again, “you know, anytime.” His dick hasn’t even hit open air yet, what the _fuck?_ “God, _Q._ ” 

Q groans. “Okay. Okay, yeah, I’ve got you, you just—” His other hand slides back, hitches against Eliot’s waist. “El, you gotta get up, I can’t—” His mouth splits into a breathless laugh. “I can’t _reach._ ”

Eliot nearly takes out the whole bench, surging to his feet. Q nearly trips over his own dick, hiking his pants back up. They scare the shit out of themselves when they run headlong into the sliding glass door, because Eliot forgot he even had a fucking sliding glass door, and this is _exactly_ what he meant when he said _logistics._

Q doesn’t care, though. Q says, “Shirt,” and, “This is your fault, you’re the one who, like, sucked my brain straight out of my— oh my god, _open._ ” He’s the one who hauls the door open, who shoves Eliot back over the threshold with one hand and drags him forward into another kiss with the other, like none of it matters, like he’s not thinking about any of it at all.

  


* * *

  


Eliot wakes up when the sliding glass door rattles shut.

His head doesn’t hurt, even though it probably should; he has the sensation of being awake earlier than he’d like to be, after having slept somewhere he didn’t mean to sleep, but without all the grinding aches and pains he usually associates with that, like a sparkling water version of unpleasantness. He’s alone on the living room floor, sprawled out in a pile of decorative pillows, modesty preserved by a combination of three separate throw blankets and yesterday’s boxer-briefs. 

Of course the first time he gets Quentin into bed, he can’t actually get Quentin _into_ a goddamn _bed._

(And look, he’d had his expectations, sure. He’s imagined it here and there. Q _reeks_ of nervy, repressed college bisexual teetering on the cusp of his first gay experience at Beach Week, and Eliot dares anyone to give him shit for lingering on the notion of— raw potential energy, coiled up and ready to snap. 

If he’d had to _guess,_ fine, maybe he wouldn’t have predicted Q tearing through all of Eliot’s buttons the way he had. Or palming Eliot’s cock through his slacks the way he did, like he was starving just for the preview. Or putting Eliot on his back on the rug in the middle of the fucking living room, straddling Eliot’s hips, groaning against his neck, rutting sloppy and dirty and messy and _eager_ — 

Listen. Eliot’s evolved. 

He can appreciate a good subversion every now and then, too.)

He gets up while Q is doing whatever he’s doing out on the patio; Eliot can see him bobbing around through the glass, half-bent over while he rifles through his messenger bag. He’s in his shirtsleeves and bare feet, his flannel tied sloppily around his waist like he’s a delinquent from a 90s teen movie.

He’s cute.

Eliot fetches a robe from upstairs, a silk one in rose-blush pink that he thinks draws some nice color back into his skin. He spends enough time on his hair to get it to settle without depriving it of too much morning-after charm, and is on his way back down to start clearing out the living room when the sliding glass door rattles open again.

Q has to try twice to get the door fully shut, after it bounces off the frame the first time. “Shirt, shirt, shirt, shirt. Fork. God—” He shoves his hair back messily from his forehead. “— _dang_ it.”

“Good morning,” Eliot says.

Q jumps like he’s been electrocuted. He swivels in place, bag clutched sideways against his chest. “Hey. Hi.” He lets one hand go long enough to smooth his hair back again, and a hardcover book tumbles out onto his feet. “Jesus. _Fork._ Sorry, I’m—”

He stoops to wrestle the book back into the bag. Eliot gets a peek at the top half of cover: _Theories of Thaumatogenesis_ — 

— _Throughout the Ages,_ Eliot’s brain fills in, because _fuck_ his fucking brain, _All the Places We Know Talent Lives, Breathes, and Thrives._

It’s a fucking terrible title. They don’t even put the whole thing on the front of the book because it won’t fit without totally dominating the cover; the subtitle gets relegated to an inside page. Eliot remembers it like somebody laser etched it onto his fucking retinas: the old timey font, with the oversized, elaborate _T_ s.

Jesus. He can’t think about this right now. He doesn’t care, he doesn’t— It doesn’t fucking matter anymore.

“Hey,” Q says again, out of breath but, for the moment, vertical. Eliot swallows past his dry throat and focuses, on Q and his shirtsleeves, his messy hair, the marks on his neck and chest that aren’t quite hidden by his collar. “Good morning. Sorry, I’m having a… morning.”

“You sure are,” Eliot says. He reaches up to flick an errant section of Q’s hair back into place. “Nothing boozy brunch can’t salvage, though. How do you feel about french toast?” 

And Quentin says, “Um,” which is— all he needs to say, really.

Eliot cinches his robe higher and tighter around his waist. “I could cook,” he goes on blithely, like he’s stupid, because he is _sticking_ this fucking landing. “Or there’s that place off the square. _Toast of the Town?_ I can get Rodrigo to tag along. Maybe Mi-jin’s had enough sex with Margo Hanson by now that she can tolerate my presence again.”

“Mi-jin was never mad at you,” Quentin says, a touch too eager to digress about neighborhood drama. He sticks his head through the strap of his bag, but only just enough that it digs into his neck instead of tucking against his shoulder. “Sascha told me that she- she gets it, you know? It wasn’t anything you did, it was—” He twists his hair into a messy knot at the back of his head. “I mean, you know. You were there. You know better than me.”

Generous of her. Gossip-y of Sascha.

“So, um,” Quentin is saying. “I can’t? Today. I have- I have to go take care of something.” He stoops by the couch, trying to put his shoes on sans-socks, while he’s still standing up. It’s not going well. “But yeah, you should- you should invite Mi-jin. And Rodrigo. And, you know, once Sascha knows you’re alive he’ll stop asking me if I’ve— oh my god.” He gives up, leaving the backs of his sneakers to their smashed fate under his heels so that he can have both hands free to drag them down his face. “You know what I mean. Just- maybe you could say hi to Sascha.”

(Eliot had planned to sleep in his own bed last night.

There is, tragically, still clean-up in the afterlife. He’d taken care of his in the downstairs half-bath, and had brought a second damp hand towel out for Quentin, as a courtesy.

“Oh shirt.” Q had still been sprawled out on the floor; Eliot remembers thinking it was cute, that it took two orgasms to finally get him that far unwound. “Thanks. Why is it that we don’t have to poop anymore but, like, jizz is still gross?”

“Mmkay,” Eliot had said. “I think we’re done with the pillow talk now.”

Q wriggled back down, against the— fucking rug, what is _with_ this obsession with the floor? “It doesn’t count,” he said. “You’re not on the pillows.”

And Eliot knew he should have gone back upstairs. He’d known it just as well then as he ever has. He’s not clueless. He’s not— fucking stupid. 

But he’d crawled back into the little nest of pillows anyway. He’d let Q put one curious hand on his waist, let himself reach up to brush Q’s hair back, let the two of them approximate something like a post-coital cuddle. “I had a timeline for you, you know,” he remembers saying. “Now you’ve gone and thrown the whole thing off.”

“Yeah, well,” Q had answered, flushed and sleepy and smug. “Maybe I got sick of waiting around.”)

“I’ll say hi to Sascha,” Eliot says.

Quentin tucks his hands into his armpits. “Okay. Cool.” His eyes skitter across the wall behind Eliot’s head. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Eliot says.

The next full second of silence is, in a word, fucking excruciating.

“Sorry,” Quentin says again, and his voice is softer but his eyes are still stuck somewhere near the crown molding. “I know what it looks like, and I swear I’m not trying to—”

Fucking _christ._ No. It’s like he’s trying to fuck this up on purpose. 

“Q.” Eliot steps forward to pluck at the scoop-neck collar of Quentin’s t-shirt. If his thumb grazes a hickey, so be it. “Last night was fun, right?”

Quentin folds his arms up tighter. His shoulders tense up by his ears, even as his mouth curls into his sweet, wry little smile. “Yeah,” he says to Eliot’s collarbone. “I mean. I thought so, anyway.”

“Then we’re on the same page.”

“Oh,” Quentin says, and it’s not quite relieved, but it isn’t disappointed either, which for Eliot’s purposes is close enough. “Okay. Um, good.” He even manages a sliver of eye-contact, slid up through his hair. “I mean, I’m, like, really craving breakfast now, but. Good.”

“To be clear,” Eliot tells him, “you’re the one turning _down_ breakfast right now.”

And that gets Quentin to laugh, so… they’re fine. Whatever else happens, that’s one thing they’ve stuck, at least. “Yeah,” he says. “I’m like- super aware of that. Believe me.”

“As long as you know what you’re missing out on,” Eliot says, as he walks him to the door, “then it’s all Gucci to me, sweetheart.”

  


* * *

  


Anyway, he’s not going to fucking say _hi_ to _Sascha._

There’s nothing stopping him from going out. He _could_ get Rodrigo to tag along, and he figures Quentin is probably right about Mi-jin, if only because it’s fed from Sascha’s intel. He just can’t stomach it today, the fucking— cutesy old town architecture and bubble letter signage and pastel colors. There’s nothing that can scratch the same itch as the greasy diner-style shithole he used to go to in the Village, hangover or no hangover, but Eliot knows he can come closer than Heaven ever could. 

He’s got a bottle of nice, dark rum that he adds to the custard, because why the fuck not, and then proceeds to also makes a rum swizzle with, because again, who gives a shit, 9AM is a social construct. The flame on the stove is perfect, and his iron skillet holds steady, even heat, and this brioche drinks up just the right amount of custard to brown to a clean, crisp crust, speckled and lovely.

His first attempt at a plate is a disaster, like it usually is. The toast is too blonde, and the whipped cream sinks under its own weight, less the delicate cloud he was going for and more an over-saturated, directionless pile. He eyeballs the negative space all wrong; four blackberries is way too many, if he wants blueberries and sliced strawberries on there too. Which, obviously.

Attempt number two is presentable. He could stand to go a little darker, probably, and he flicks his wrist too much doling out the whipped cream this time, but the ratio of colors to neutrals is good enough that he wouldn’t be totally humiliated to put it in front of another person. 

Number three is, naturally, perfection. He gets a dreamy brown sear on both sides of the bread. The whipped cream is fluffy and effortless. The berries are bright and balanced bursts of eye-catching color. _Toast of the Town_ could fucking never. 

“Janet?” he says.

She pops into existence at his elbow. “Hi,” she says. “How can I help?”

“Is it bad form to ask you to do a delivery for me?”

“Not at all.” She holds both hands out palm-up, and it takes Eliot a second to understand that she wants him to stack the plates on top of them like she’s a smiling, helpful dumbwaiter with the capacity for teleportation. “Where are we going?”

He sets his second plate on her right hand. “This is for Margo Hanson,” he tells her. “And make sure she gets the right one. I want her to know she’s getting the dregs of the barrel.” He sets his third plate on her left. “This one is just for aesthetics.”

“Margo says, ‘Less sugar, more rum’,” Janet reports when she rematerializes next to him a few minutes later, in what Eliot is very sure is a more Janet-y version of whatever Margo actually said, “and also that they need to be cooked longer on both sides, and that ‘only a thirsty bench needs to act like a tease.’”

“You can tell her,” Eliot says, lifting his chin as much as he can while he scrapes down the skillet, “to stick a fork in it.”

“Okay!”

Janet blips out. When she comes back, she brings the cleared plate back with her. There’s a dick drawn in the leftover whipped cream, a smooth curve dotted with the two blackberries Margo apparently declined to eat. It’s abstract, but artistic. It sends a message. He can see her in his mind’s eye, sucking cream off the tip of her middle finger while she flips him off.

So. 

As far as landings go, he thinks he did alright.


	6. Chapter 6

The next day, Quentin doesn’t knock.

Eliot’s been up for— whatever, a while, by that point. He’s not counting; why sleep when he’s dead, what’s an hour to an eternity, et cetera. He’s been thinking about Q’s thing with the fire pit. Not Q _and_ the fire pit— although that too, yes, _jesus,_ line item number two on the list-of-reasons-this-could-be-actual-Heaven: Q’s throat thrown back in the flickering firelight— but Q _about_ the fire pit. 

He’s right, drunk people do like bonfires; Eliot can attest, being the sometimes-savant of reckless drunkenness that he is. But sometimes the bonfire is like the one they had that night— intimate and contained, a setting piece, an evocative backdrop— and other times it’s like the blowout pasture bonfires he went to in high school— chaotic and dangerous and ninety percent the point, something to hurl empty bottles into just to see the shower of sparks when they hit the half-disintegrated logs at the center.

To be clear: he doesn’t want to go to another fucking pasture bonfire for the rest of his detached, non-denominational existence. But there’s _something_ there. Intimacy and awe, elegance and engagement, stability but not safety. 

Margo Hanson had saturation; Eliot wants breadth. He wants the day to _be_ the event, for it to transmogrify itself into whatever it needs to be for a particular hour, for a particular person. He wants the sparking activation energy _and_ the slow-burn smolder. 

He gets Janet to set up a recessed fire pit in the center of the yard, wrapped all the way around with slatted wood seating in a rich, dark stain. He needs cushions, too, but the jury’s still out on his color palette— he’d thought he’d had something going with an orchid/forest/burnt ochre situation, but the longer he looks at it the more he’s sick of it. He thinks maybe he could stand a full overhaul.

Anyway, he’s doing that, and when Quentin shows up, he doesn’t bother with the front door at all, which is— it’s probably a good sign. Eliot’s decided it’s a good sign. 

“Hey,” Quentin calls, as he turns the corner of the house, “it’s me,” as if Eliot might be expecting anyone else in the aftermath of blowing his best-slash-only friend in his own backyard. 

“Good timing,” Eliot says, “I need input: slate or steel?”

“The materials? Or, like, colors?” Quentin sounds distracted; Eliot can hear him moving around behind him on the patio, dragging a chair out to dump his bag into it.

“Colors. Blue.” 

“Uh, I don’t know what the difference is,” Quentin says. “But if I had to pick: steel, I guess.”

“Steel,” Eliot says to Janet, and she flips the color of the upholstery. It reminds him of being in the computer lab during his lunch period in middle school, playing with the little dropper tool in MS Paint. “That’s why I bring the taste,” he calls back over his shoulder, “and you bring the decisive action.”

“Yeah, sure,” Quentin answers, “uh, whatever I can do to help,” so there’s a zero percent chance he’s actually listening. When Eliot turns around, he’s bent over one of the patio tables, fidgeting with a doggy bag he brought with him. He only lifts his head to push his hair out of his face, and to lift his chin hello when he finds Eliot looking. The yard gets a passing glance at first, but Eliot’s all nighter must be paying off somewhere, because it snaps right back into a double-take.

“Wow.” Quentin smiles, and it’s… tense, maybe, but genuine. Eliot’s decided that’s a good sign, too. “You’ve— made progress.”

“I had an epiphany,” Eliot says. 

Quentin relaxes in his shoulders, if not his face. “Uh, yeah. I can see that.” He eyes the fire pit. “Is it bad if I point out that it kinda looks _more_ like you’re about to do a ritual sacrifice in your backyard, now?”

“No,” Eliot says, “because now I’m doing it on purpose.” He pops up onto the patio. “What’s that?”

Quentin looks down. His hands freeze over the mouth of the bag. “Oh, uh, yeah. I was just, um.” He starts picking his way through decorative tissue paper. “I thought, uh, if you wanted to, like— take a break? I could...” He rifles a bit more, and comes up with one of the colorful individual serving boxes from their bakery.

“I figured you had your own coffee already,” Q explains, as Eliot takes the box. He’s right. “And that, uh, you probably wouldn’t want me to roll the dice on which one of your nine hundred different orders I should get, anyway. But you’ve really been missing out the past couple days, so...”

Eliot pops the lid open. It’s a perfect slice of brioche, with a lovely cinnamon swirl. 

“Um, so,” Quentin says. He’s briefly very focused on wiping his palms on his jeans. “What are we working on?”

And, so, you know, this is— Eliot doesn’t really know how to parse this situation. 

Or, well, he _does_ ; he’s been on the receiving end of this move enough times to _know,_ alright, even if Q’s version is… lower key, maybe, than the time Mason ordered them bottle service the same night Eliot found out he was getting cropped out of all the pictures Mason showed his family. It just doesn’t really fit with the _everything else_ of the situation, the way he was seeing it. He’d thought… but maybe not?

He could ask, he guesses. How passé.

“‘We’?” he asks instead, dropping down into one of the long patio chairs.

Q focuses on the bag again. He has a separate box for himself, one that smells like apples when an improbably well-timed breeze skips past them. “Well, yeah,” he says. “I can, like… I mean, I’m another set of eyes, at least, right?”

Eliot watches him. Specifically, he watches Q’s eyes dart up to watch Eliot’s fork, when he takes his first bite. “You certainly are _at least_ that.”

Q levels a playful glare at him. “Well, I have a bunch of reading I need to catch up on, too, so.” He starts pulling books out of his bag, all them heavy hardcover textbooks— and Eliot shouldn’t bother looking, but he does anyway; one of the titles is _Lunar Circumstances: A Phased Approach._ “I promise I won’t, like, distract you from your process, or whatever.”

“Aw,” Eliot says. He lets the tines of his fork drag across his bottom lip. “Where’s the fun in that?” 

(Anyway, spoilers: they fuck again.

Q’s tongue only tastes like wine, when he crawls into Eliot’s lap a couple hours later, well into the mild autumn afternoon. But there’s a burst of leftover apple-ginger right at the corner of his mouth— and Eliot can’t help it, has already chased away the sweetness with his tongue before he even registers that he’s doing it.

It’s apparently weird enough to get Q to pull back, with a wary, self-conscious little smile. “What?”

“What?” Eliot returns, “You taste good, baby,” the best excuse he can think of. He slides his hands back, cups Q’s ass in both palms, and focuses on the warm coil of pleasure tightening between them. It really is a great ass. “Come on, let me feel you.”

They don’t do anything complicated; it’s just some light necking and a couple of lazy daytime handjobs, with an added burst of exhibitionist flavor from doing it outside during the day, but— that’s fine. It’s good. Less mess. … Metaphorically and metaphysically, at least.

Eliot can work with that.)

  


* * *

  


The day after that, Quentin shows up closer to lunch than breakfast.

“Just in time,” Eliot says. “Here I was starting to worry I was going to have to ask Janet to do double-duty. Or worst of all, fend for myself.” He lounges back in one of the patio chairs while Quentin unpacks his doggy bag: lemon poppyseed and blueberry and a hearty cranberry walnut, today.

“Sorry,” Quentin says, and he sounds actually apologetic, even though he’s the one doing Eliot a favor. “I, um, I got held up.”

“Yes, I’ve met you,” Eliot tells him. “Don’t worry, if it’s a choice between me and _Principia Whateverica,_ I know where I stand.”

Quentin has the nerve to roll his eyes, when _he’s_ the one who eats sweet bread with his hands like it’s toast. “It’s pronounced with a hard ‘c’,” he says as he passes Eliot a box of blueberry, “‘Prin- _kip_ -ia’,” as if that makes any difference at all.

Eliot demonstrates civilized behavior by cutting neatly into his slice with the edge of his complimentary plastic fork. Q apparently doesn’t notice, already scooping his lemon poppyseed out with his fingers. “All alone in one of the corner booths,” Eliot muses around his bite. “Scribbling the morning away. You’re really leaning into the aesthetic without me, I see.”

Quentin hesitates, with his mouth still open. His whole expression melts with distress, like he accidentally swallowed when he meant to spit.

“Oh,” Eliot says, “ _there’s_ a story.”

Quentin’s face doesn’t get any better, but he takes a stubborn bite like he thinks it might help. “There’s not,” he says. He pauses to swallow, and _then_ he says, “I talked to Margo Hanson this morning.”

The pit of Eliot’s stomach lights up. 

It’s not surprising. He was almost expecting it. _Almost,_ because he didn’t expect her to be quite this blatant about it— but really, why shouldn’t she be? From her perspective, he’s been laying low. She must be reading an opportune time to strike.

Oh, _Bambi._

“Or— More like she talked to me,” Quentin is saying, his non-crumby hand rifling back through his hair, “I guess,” and, yeah. No insult to Quentin, but it definitely makes more sense the other way around. 

“What did she want?” he asks.

Q squints at him sideways, like _Eliot_ is the one with suspicious motives here. “Nothing? I mean, she just kind of sat down. The book I was reading has— Um, it’s a first edition, so the spine has this, like…” He makes a wiggly gesture. “I mean, it’s subtle, but it’s pretty distinctive if you know anything about the history of, um—” 

Eliot has no idea what he’s talking about. 

“Never mind,” Q says, before he can ask. “It’s- It’s not important.” He abandons his bread to take a too-large gulp from his coffee cup that probably would have burned his mouth, if that was a thing that happened in not-Heaven. “She recognized it, that’s all. She asked me about it.”

He stops there, fidgeting with the plastic lid. “And?” Eliot prompts.

Q leans back in his chair, arms folded tight across his middle. He’s definitely hiding something, then. “And that’s it,” he says, snappish. “We talked for a couple minutes, and then she got bored and left.”

“And my name didn’t come up at all?”

“El.”

“Not once?”

“I’m not doing this, Eliot. I’m not gonna let you, like, _Mean Girls_ me.”

“I just think that, as your friend, I deserve to know if you and Margo Hanson are gossiping about me behind my back.” 

Quentin snorts, and it’s almost a laugh, which is how Eliot knows this is going to pan out in his favor. “Are you— jesus. We didn’t _gossip_ about you. I wouldn’t do that.” 

He stops again, but Eliot knows how to play this hand. He waits. One, two, three— 

Quentin sighs. He turns his face away, but there’s already redness creeping up from his neck. “I mean,” he says, “I might’ve mentioned you, like, once. But not because she was fishing for it, or- or whatever your weird conspiracy theory is. Seriously, she didn’t even really react to it.”

Eliot waits.

“Fine,” Q snaps. “Just— fine,” and then he hooks the paper to-go bag toward him with one finger, fishes through the nest of wax paper, and comes up with a paper menu from the bakery. It’s folded in half, and addressed in glittery pink gel pen to, simply: _The Legs._

“Oh,” Eliot says, reaching over to pluck it from Q’s fingers, and in the process ignoring Q’s pissy little sigh, “hello, plot twist.”

“This is stupid,” Q tells him. “For the record.”

The note says, in elegant, angular handwriting:

_Congrats on all the sex ♥  
Your boy is glowing  
and he’s like 15% less annoying now.  
Pro-tip: he’s got a thing for wood nymphs, I can tell.  
I think you could pull it off if you tried.  
60/40 odds say he hits his knees on the spot   
or he laughs you out of the afterlife.  
Either way I get a show.  
\- M_

“Did you read this?” Eliot asks carefully.

“No,” Quentin says, like the very idea never even crossed his mind. It probably did, but he wants to pretend it didn’t. He’s cute. “Why?”

Eliot gives it a quick tri-fold and tucks it into his breast pocket. “No reason.” He tears off the lid of his bakery box. “You realize I have to respond now.”

“ _No,_ ” Quentin says again.

Eliot appropriates a pen from the front pocket of Quentin’s bag; there’s like eight hundred of them in there, so he thinks he should be allowed. _Bambi,_ he writes, taking the extra care to loop his _B_ and dot his _i_ with a heart. _Lovely to hear from you._

“Eliot, I told you, I’m not doing this.”

_So glad you could take time out of your busy schedule getting mediocre orgasms from undersexed co-eds to check in_

“Are you listening?”

_but you’ll be pleased to hear that I have QC’s proverbial wood very much in hand, so you can keep the Cosmo advice section for yourself. Have you tried the thing with the ice yet? It’ll change your life._

“Hm?” Eliot says, and signs _E_ with a flourish. “Oh. No. Here, hold onto this for me.” He folds the note in half, and then in fourths, creasing the edges with his thumbnail. Quentin glares at him when Eliot leans over to tuck it into the front pocket of his jeans but, notably, doesn’t try to stop him. “You probably don’t want to read that one, either.”

“This is so dumb,” Quentin grumbles. 

Eliot pushes up from the table. “That’s the game, baby.” He lets his hand linger on the curve of Quentin’s shoulder as he passes. “B-R-B.”

(He’s just freshening up. The bronze liner brings out the green in his eyes. And while he’s at it, he’s got a nice organza top that will be so much more breathable, if he’s going to spend the whole day outside. And he’s of course got to coordinate from there: swap in a pair of high-waisted trousers in walnut brown and a pair of taller boots that lace up. Tousle his hair a bit. Let everything go a bit, hm— wild. 

Q seems to appreciate it, anyway. He appreciates it _very_ thoroughly. With just— outstanding attention to detail, jesus fucking christ. Q’s thesis _wishes_ it could achieve these towering heights of inspiration.

So, you know. 

Noted.)

  


* * *

  


Margo’s next note comes pinned to the elbow of Quentin’s sweater. It’s written in black sharpie on a bright yellow scrap of paper torn from somewhere else, and she didn’t bother to fold it, this time.

_**CALL ME BAMBI ONE MORE TIME SHIRT WEASEL  
I FORKING DARE YOU** _

“Written words too?” Eliot muses. “That just seems cruel.”

“Has that been there this whole time?” Quentin says. He twists to check his other arm. “I was talking to Rodrigo for like twenty minutes today.”

Eliot’s already rifling through the front pockets of Quentin’s bag for a pen, but all he’s coming up with are ballpoints, which is ridiculous. Academics should know better than anyone when a situation calls for a bold statement. “If _he_ starts calling _you_ Bambi, then we’ll really know we have a problem.” He bolts up, one hand flat against Q’s forearm. “ _Ooh,_ idea. Janet, how good are you with origami?”

“I am _very_ good,” Janet says.

“No way, come on,” Quentin says. “I’m drawing the line at- at not crushing some over-the-top origami sculpture for you.”

“Just wait,” Eliot promises him. “You’ll be on board once you see it.” Which is… on second thought, maybe overambitious, even for him. “And even if you’re not, I made frosé popsicles for us today, so one good turn deserves another.”

He’s tipping his hand a bit— the popsicles are out of season for the extended autumn they’ve been having the past few days, and so not really poised to be test-driven just yet— but, like, come on. Can you just imagine the look on Margo Hanson’s face? Eliot’s almost sad to miss it.

He picks a study cardstock in honey yellow, to complement the undertones in her hair. With a paint pen in oxblood, he writes, _To my Bambi, with Love._

Even better, the delicate folded deer Janet comes back with _is,_ it turns out, enough to bring Quentin on board. He even squats down so he can marvel about it at eye-level. “Wait,” he says. “Janet, this is- actually incredible.”

“I know!” Janet says.

“I don’t think it even obeys the laws of physics?” He looks up at Eliot, like Eliot will have any thoughts at all to contribute to this observation. “You know, how like you can’t fold a piece of paper more than, like, seven times or something?”

“It doesn’t!” Janet says.

Which, when all taken together— “Well, this is awkward,” Eliot has to admit, when they go back in the house to fetch the frosé. “Now I feel like I need to hold these for another time.”

Q is way ahead of him, skidding around the corner into the kitchen. “Nope,” he says over his shoulder, at the same time he’s bending over to pop open Eliot’s bottom-drawer freezer, his hair a loose mess across his face. “Not my fault you showed your hand.”

And, okay, what’s Eliot supposed to do? _Not_ sidle up behind him, _not_ get his hands around the points of Q’s hips, _not_ bend over too so that they’re basically flush, back to front? “I could show you something,” he says against the nape of Q’s neck.

“Stop,” Q complains, but he’s laughing too— Eliot can feel the vibration through his torso. “You really don’t need to make these, like, even more of an innuendo than they already are.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Eliot says. He tucks his chin into the crook of Q’s neck, just to feel him jolt with ticklish surprise. “Everything I make is culinary creative expression. There’s a piece of my very soul in every—”

“Yeah,” Q says, “the part of your soul that’s just- you know, your you-know-what reimagined as an alcoholic dessert.”

He laughs again when Eliot slumps against him. “God, that’s so much worse than the kindergarten euphemisms,” Eliot says. “I am literally begging you to never call my penis a _you-know-what_ again.”

Q nudges the freezer drawer shut with his foot and bullies Eliot back until he has enough room to turn around, his back to the refrigerator. “So you admit you made a bunch of popsicles that look like penises.”

“Rosé is naturally a pale pink,” Eliot says. He sets one elbow flat against the fridge door, to give himself the leverage to lean in. It’s a tantalizing contrast, the icy air from the freezer bag between them, and the heat of Q’s breath on his skin. “And a cylinder is a traditional, easy to consume form for a popsicle. Art is in the eye of the beholder. You see what you want to see, sweetheart.”

“Cut it out,” Q murmurs, but he doesn’t move except to lift his chin so that their mouths can slot more naturally together. “I know what you’re doing.”

“Yeah?” Eliot lets his other hand crawl around to the small of Q’s back, to better hitch their hips together. “Well, then, maybe...”

Someone rings the doorbell.

“For the love of—” Eliot ducks his chin, just in time for Quentin to snicker against his cheek. “Literally the only one who ever bothers with the- stupid doorbell is you. What _now?_ ”

Quentin wiggles out from under Eliot’s arm, moment thoroughly broken. “I hope it’s Margo,” he says, shifting to dump the freezer bag down onto the counter. “So you guys can work out this weird— whatever you’re doing on your own, and leave me out of it.”

The bell rings again. “Hello?” Michael calls through the door. “Anybody home?”

Which, uh. What the fuck?

Quentin’s brows draw sharply together too, so there’s that comfort, at least. But Eliot’s not about to get kicked out of maybe-Heaven for being a bad host to the interminable being that shepherds his soul, so he drifts out into the dining room to call back, “Door’s open, Mike.” 

Quentin mouths _Mike?_ incredulously at him, as he peels a popsicle out of the plastic. Eliot waves him off.

“Excellent!” Michael says, still muffled. He swings the front door open; his suit is in dark olive green today, and his bowtie is a rich, textured goldenrod. “So glad I caught you, Eliot,” he says, striding quick and sure across the foyer. “Hope I’m not interrupting too much. I just wanted to have a quick...”

He stops short, just over the threshold of the dining room. “Oh,” he says, the way a probably-omnipotent being of the universe should never just fucking say _’oh.’_ “Quentin’s here.”

Quentin pulls his popsicle out of his mouth. It’s pink and wet and audibly _pops._ Jesus, Eliot’s been fucking east coast boys for going-on five years now, and he _still_ can’t fathom sometimes how some of them just— exist, like that, with absolutely no idea.

“Um,” Quentin says, skepticism flattening out across his face. “Is that a problem…?”

Michael takes his glasses off to rub between his eyes. Should angels be able to get headaches? “No, no,” he says. “Of course not. Hello, Quentin.”

Quentin opens his mouth again. “Good to see you, Michael,” Eliot intercepts. “What can I do for you?”

“Oh,” Michael says again, and Eliot doesn’t feel any better about it the second time, “you know, just checking in. Wanted to see how you were doing. What you’ve been—” His eyes dart around the room like they’re in a pinball machine, and land not inconspicuously on Quentin, with his fucking popsicle back in his fucking mouth. “— getting up to.”

“Well, you know me,” Eliot says. “Using the freedom from expectation and suffering to tap into my true artistic self. Et cetera.”

“Sure,” Michael says. “Of course.”

He fiddles with his cufflinks.

“Okay,” Eliot says. “Well, if that’s all, Q and I can—”

“So long as you’re making the most of it,” Michael blurts, and now he’s upgraded to full-on wringing his hands. “That is to say, the neighborhood has plenty to offer. Would hate to see you… miss out. On anything.”

And Eliot— thinks about Janet, the other morning. About _’Oops!’_ About cosmic mistakes, omniscient snafus, the bureaucratic bullshit of the afterlife. He feels his skin crawling, suddenly, which is stupid; he doesn’t even have skin anymore, why the fuck would they bake that specific feeling into the experience? So that he can have a natural and realistic reaction to whatever the fuck this is? Michael finally realizing that one of his lost souls is way more lost than they should be, in fact got sorted to completely the wrong fucking place, but he’s, like, an angel or whatever the fuck, so he’s too good to turn Eliot in himself? Is that what’s happening right now?

Quentin clears his throat. “I mean,” he says, and he’s talking to Michael, but Eliot can feel his eyes sliding toward him. “We’re here for, like, ever, right? Kinda hard to miss out on anything ”

“Good point!” Michael says, giving him a pair of over-enthusiastic finger-guns. He’s a fucking miserable actor, which Eliot guesses angels probably should be. “Yes, good point. Thank you, Quentin. But we do try to change things up every now and again. You know, keep things interesting while you still have a linear concept of time, that sort of thing. So.” He smiles at Eliot, so thin he probably shouldn’t have even bothered. “We’d love to see more of you. That’s all I wanted to pass along.”

“Who wouldn’t?” Eliot says. “Will keep it front of mind.”

Michael’s smile brightens into something more stable. “Wonderful,” he says, clasping both hands. “Wonderful. Have a good day, gentleman.”

He probably doesn’t slam the door when he leaves. That doesn’t jive with the kind of maybe-angel Eliot assumes he is, the kind of guardian that says daycare 101 shit like, _“Everyone goes through an adjustment period.”_ It just feels like it does, to Eliot. Like the door shuts, and the reverberation is strong enough to startle him back into himself.

He swallows. He makes his head turn, shoulders level, spine straight, and— Q is watching him. Still in the kitchen. Still with his hair a mess. Still with the fucking popsicle.

“El,” he says, in this— soft, urgent way that turns Eliot’s stomach. “What just happened?”

“Somebody has a performance evaluation coming up, I think,” Eliot says. He points at Q’s hands, to have something to look at that isn’t Q’s disbelieving little frown. “I hope you’re keeping tabs on the full spectrum of your inner experience while you eat that. I expect a comprehensive writeup.”

(It’s fine.

So if Q seems especially determined about something the next time he’s on his knees, well— Eliot’s not thinking about that. He’s thinking about Q’s mouth, still flushed and red from the frosé. About how his lips are still chilly, but his tongue is white-hot. About how he can’t take Eliot all the way, but _god_ how he _tries,_ his mouth and his throat and his clever fingers all working together.

Eliot’s not intending to miss out on any of it.)

  


* * *

  


Margo doesn’t send a reply back. 

“I dunno,” Quentin says, after they’ve checked all his nooks and crannies— and not even in a coy way, in an actual way, one that involves Eliot getting very acquainted with the full spectrum of minute bullshit Q lugs around in that bag all day. Even after Q has squirreled all the books aside (which, not that Eliot is looking, but one of the titles is _The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Magical Disciplines_ ), there’s still bits of scrap paper and gum wrappers, rubber bands and paper clips, and just _so_ many hair ties. “I didn’t see her. I wasn’t there super long, so maybe she missed me, but...”

He trails off, can’t seem to find it in himself to say it outright: _but_ it’s not Margo Hanson’s style, is it, to fuck up something as simple as timing. The chill that runs up Eliot’s spine is, he thinks, equal parts dread and erotic fascination.

“Hold still,” he says, and plucks a plain black pen from the pile they’ve left on the table.

Quentin doesn’t question it; he just holds still, while Eliot tears a rectangle from his paper to-go bag and braces it against his chest. _Bambi,_ is all he writes, _I’m disappointed._

Quentin squirms, turning his face away. This close, Eliot can feel him swallow. “Oh,” he starts, managing to be about as covert as the two-way mirrors they used to have in the bathrooms at _St. Cod_. “So, hey. There’s— I don’t know if you heard. There’s this thing happening in the square soon.”

Eliot thinks he maybe did hear. Or, he recalls being physically present while Sascha was talking about something like that, at least. 

He clicks the pen closed. “You’re going to the farmer’s market?”

Quentin stares at him. “What?” he says. “No. What?” He blinks himself out of it. “Why would we need a farmer’s market in the afterlife?”

“That’s what I wondered.”

“It’s not a farmer’s market,” Quentin says. “It’s like... an art walk? I guess? You know, Fatima has her paintings, and Mi-jin does all that woodworking. I was gonna check it out, maybe, and I thought— Um, it seemed like something you might like. If you wanted to… go. Also.”

So that’s… that.

Look, Eliot’s not clueless. He’s not. Okay? He knows what’s happening. He could read this subtext even if it _wasn’t_ laid out on the flashing marquee of Quentin’s face: the hopeful lift of his brow, the flat, nervous line of his mouth, his fingers plucking at the seam on the front pocket of his jeans. If Eliot is being really, truly, brutally honest— which, to be clear, he tries to be as infrequently as possible, but it seems kind of beyond the pale now— he’s known what was coming since the first perfect little slice of cinnamon swirl brioche. Since, _”I know what this looks like and I swear it’s not.”_ Since, _”Um, so,”_ around the fire pit. Since the hand at the small of his back on the doorstep of the apartment building. Since— a while, is his point.

Maybe it makes him a shitty person, not doing more about it, or anything about it, but… whatever. Not like that’s news anyway.

“I just,” Quentin is saying. “I was thinking about what Michael said, right? Uh, about there being more to do in the neighborhood. And… maybe it’s dumb, but I could probably stand to get out more, too.” His twisty little half-smile makes an appearance. “Not to, like, state the obvious or anything.”

Right. It would be good advice for anyone, wouldn’t it? Take advantage of the opportunities you’ve been given.

Eliot folds his note into a simple concertina. He knows exactly what Quentin is doing, so Eliot also knows exactly what _he’s_ doing when he says, “Maybe.” He’s not looking at Quentin’s face to see whatever happens there. “Mi-jin does woodworking?”

Credit where credit is due: Quentin takes the brushoff like a champ. He only hesitates long enough to step back and draw his to-go bag toward him by the torn edge Eliot left at the top.

“Uh, yeah,” he says. “It’s, um, it’s kind of cool, actually, she makes tables and chairs and stuff.” He frowns curiously, down at the bag. “She hasn’t mentioned it to you before?”

Eliot pulls up a chair. He needs a cigarette. “I don’t know, maybe.” It sounds familiar, at least, like maybe it was a conversation he tuned out of. “That’s the draw for you? Mi-jin’s tables and chairs?”

Quentin makes flickering eye contact. “Don’t laugh.”

“Oh, Q,” Eliot says. “You know I don’t make promises.”

“That’s, like, demonstrably not true.” 

It’s gauche to confirm _or_ deny, Eliot thinks. He shrugs, and lights his cigarette.

Quentin reaches into the bag to pull out his package-of-the-day. It looks like challah, if Eliot had to guess, wrapped tight and still warm. “When I was a kid,” Quentin starts, and then he stops. “I mean, everybody has delusions of grandeur when they’re kids, right? Everybody thinks they’re going to be— an astronaut, or some famous scientist discovering the cure for cancer, or- or president, or whatever.”

“Did you think you were going to be president?” Eliot asks. Quentin glares at him sideways, half-smiling.

“No,” he says. “My best friend was— This isn’t the point.” He’s cute. “My point is, you think you’re going to do all this stuff, and see all these things, and accomplish all your… dreams, or whatever. But it turns out growing up isn’t actually like that. You kinda just have to take what you can get, you know? So I’m...” He fiddles with the sticker holding the wax paper together. Eliot knows that it’s in the shape of a round, smiling sun with sunglasses. “I don’t know. There are all these people here, from all different places and all different backgrounds. And I’ll never get to go to… England, or- or China, or India, or whatever, but at least I can fake it for a little bit. You know?” 

Eliot— doesn’t know, not really. Like, he _understands_ it; Quentin wants to experience the world his highbrow Ivy education couldn’t give him. Everybody wants to study abroad in college. He just thinks that Quentin probably missed out on less than he thinks he did. “Sure,” he says, leaning over to tap his cigarette against the table’s built-in ceramic ashtray. “I think that makes sense.”

Quentin flashes him a quick, tense smile, and then his eyes drop down to the package again. “Listen, uh.” He thumbs through the sticker, and the wax paper spills apart. It is challah, shiny with a honey glaze on top. “I know that you—”

“Hi!” Janet says, directly into Eliot’s ear, because she’s suddenly _right there,_ bent over him with both hands on the armrests of his chair. “You have three seconds.”

Eliot nearly loses his whole fucking cigarette into his goddamn lap. “Jesus _fork._ ”

Quentin’s face drops into a shocked, open-mouthed grin. “No. _No,_ ” Eliot snaps at him. He has to lean under Janet’s armpit to point, and it’s not even worth it. “You heard nothing, do you understand?”

“I mean,” Quentin says, “it was pretty memorable, so…”

“Three!” Janet says.

_Jesus._ Eliot forces himself to shift his focus. “What, what? Three until what?”

“Two!” Janet says, beaming at him.

“Okay!” Eliot tries. “Alright, okay, _wait._ I hear what Michael’s saying, okay? If he needs me to sit in a circle and sing Kumbaya with all the other lost souls, I—”

“ _One!_ ” Margo Hanson screams from the front of the house. “Get out here now, corksleeves!”

Janet straightens up, still smiling. Eliot feels every fucking muscle in his goddamn not-a-body go loose, all at the same time.

Margo. Right. Margo Hanson. 

Quentin’s already craning his neck, like he’s half expecting her to come storming the backyard, family-friendly squirt guns ablazin’. “How’d she even know I was here?”

Eliot swings out of his chair. He smooths out the lines of his button-down, and tries to think of a diplomatic way to phrase ‘you’ve been gagging for it for almost an entire week’. “Well—”

“Please!” Margo shouts. “You’re the Ghost of Christmas forking Past of getting your deck wet, Coldwater!”

“I don’t know what that _means!_ ” Quentin shouts back.

“Alright,” Eliot says. He sets one hand high on Quentin’s back to steer him forward. “We’re not animals. Let’s spare the neighbors, shall we, children?”

Margo’s already invited herself into his front yard, apparently; she’s in big sunglasses and a violet romper, her hair glossy straight, with his front gate wide open behind her. “It means,” she says, “you think you’re out here doing something, when actually you’re just catching up to what everybody else already knows.” She flips her hair over one shoulder and sets her hands on her hips. “Duh.”

“Bambi,” Eliot says. “Just when I was starting to worry I wouldn’t hear from you today.”

“Shut the fork up,” she answers, without looking at him; Eliot doesn’t need to see her eyes to know they’re trained on Quentin’s open-mouthed indignation. “Had to skip breakfast with your boytoy this morning, but it’s fine.” She snaps her fingers. “Let’s go, you’re both coming with me.” 

“Uh, no?” Quentin manages, finally. “You can’t just, like, show up here and expect us to—”

“Your pants are still up,” Margo says, “so whatever I interrupted can’t be that interesting.” She snaps her fingers again, three times in quick succession, already turning on her stiletto heel. “Let’s _go._ ”

Quentin scoffs under his breath. He folds up, stubborn arms over his chest and grumpy lines across his forehead. When Eliot catches his eye, it all slumps right back out of him. “No,” he says. “El. Come on.”

“I mean,” Eliot says carefully, “at the very least, you have to admit to some curiosity.”

“Oh my god,” Quentin says. “This is _so_ stupid.”

“I’m just saying, if we play along a bit, maybe—”

“No,” Quentin says. He presses his fingers against his eyes. “I literally— I can’t believe I’m even surprised. Let’s just go.” He stalks off across the front yard, trailing in Margo Hanson’s swaying, shimmering wake.

She takes them to a cute café off of one of the smaller side streets. It’s nice enough, with outdoor seating and a distinctly French-American vibe; a little basic, but it’s at least basic in a different way than the rest of the neighborhood. 

Also, when they’re on their way in, Sascha Bykov is on his way out.

Eliot has to assume at this point that Sascha has a tracker in Quentin’s left shoe, or that he’s unlocked the cheat code for Janet’s GPS features, or something like that. Sascha has to duck under the low-hanging European doorframe to even make it out of the café, but when he straightens back up he throws both arms out in jolly surprise.

“Well, well!” He catches Quentin by the shoulder in a friendly jostle, “Quentin!” then inclines his head at Margo like he’s in respectful awe of a jungle cat. “Margo.”

“Hi, Sascha,” Q says, mouth quirking politely. Margo doesn’t say anything, pursing her lips and lifting her chin.

“And _Eliot._ ” Sascha lets Q go, apparently to give himself the wingspan to get his entire arm around Eliot’s neck. “It’s good to see you again, my friend, good to see you.”

“Hi, Sascha,” Eliot says, and pretends he doesn’t see Q’s judgmental little brow raise in his periphery.

“I’m on the clock here,” Margo says, “so if you’re gonna get a circle going, at least do it out of the main lane of traffic.”

“Of course, of course.” Sascha steps graciously out of the way, and, in the process, drags Eliot graciously with him. “I’d like to borrow him,” he says, alarmingly, “if that’s alright.”

“Watch me give a shirt,” Margo answers, already pushing through the café’s front door.

Q stays where he is. It takes Sascha staring at him for a solid ten or fifteen seconds for him to get the hint. “Oh,” he says, and does Eliot the courtesy of tossing a bewildered, unsure glance his way. “Uh, okay?”

“Order me a scone,” Eliot tells him. “Strawberry, please.”

Q frowns, but he nods, and ducks inside.

Sascha doesn’t let go, once they’re alone. He just shifts so that his elbow hooks more neatly around Eliot’s neck… and Eliot thinks again about that time Q was like, _If it were possible for us to get murdered, this is it, this is that scene._ You know, coincidentally.

“You know,” Sascha begins amiably, “we were starting to worry about you.”

“‘We’?” Eliot echoes. “Should I be making plans for an apology tour?”

Sascha laughs his sawed-off shotgun laugh. “Well, Quentin,” he amends. “And me. But, Quentin.”

Eliot can see Q through the café’s front window. He’s arguing with Margo about something now, and it must be something good, because he’s started doing that jabby thing with his entire left hand, and she’s actually deigned to look at him, her shoulders dropped at an aggressive, haughty angle.

“You know him,” Eliot says. “He’s a worrier.”

Sascha hums. “Maybe so,” he says, “maybe so.” He gives Eliot’s shoulders a squeeze, and now Eliot is thinking about the junkyard scene from that movie about the toaster he was traumatized by as a kid. You know. Coincidentally. “But here you are now, yes?”

“Technically, this was Margo,” Eliot says, and Sascha laughs again.

“It always is,” he says. “It always is.” He takes his arm most of the way back, finally, pausing to leave one big hand between Eliot’s shoulderblades. “Either way,” he says. “Quentin Coldwater looks out for you. You should remember that.”

And then he smacks Eliot on the back, right at the base of his neck, and Eliot finally learns what the difference is between Sascha’s friendly smacks and his pointed ones. Namely, probably twenty degrees of spinal flexion.

“Anyway, I should get going,” Sascha says. “Mi-jin is going to give me an earful.” When Eliot cranes his neck up, sure enough, Mi-jin is on the corner, glaring at them. “Good to see you, Eliot! Have a good lunch.”

“Yep,” Eliot manages, counting the pops as he straightens his back. He twinkles his fingers at Mi-jin, who… keeps glaring, so maybe Quentin was wrong about her hating him, actually. “Bye.”

“You took too long,” Margo tells him, when he’s together enough to actually make it inside the café. She points at a collection of dishes on the takeout counter with her middle finger, where Q is already trying to, Eliot presumes, geometry his way into transporting them. “Help carry,” she orders, and then she shoulders past him back out onto the patio.

There’s a whole spread: delicate tea sandwiches and gleaming glazed pastries, pots of tea and pitchers of coffee and tiny individual shots of espresso. There’s one carafe of what looks like Tom Collins, and another that has to be jalapeño margarita, and also a bread and butter plate in flamingo pink with a single strawberry scone.

“Naughty,” Eliot says, as he comes up beside Q at the counter. “Does Bambi know you’re messing with her menu?”

Q doesn’t even bother to turn his head when he rolls his eyes. “Shut up,” he says. “Hold this.” He passes over the plate with Eliot’s scone. “You know you can make friends the normal way, right?”

“Not familiar,” Eliot answers, scooping up plates of cannelés with his other hand. “Here. Hold your arm out flat, like this. You can balance plates on your forearm, and then you’ve got a free hand for the carafe.”

“I just want to remind you,” Q says, sticking his right arm obediently out, “uh, _again,_ that this is your fault.”

Eliot scoops up the last of the painted ceramic mugs. “Mm,” he agrees. “That does sound like me.”

Margo has a table picked out; the _best_ table, actually, the one that’s tucked right into the corner of the patio, with the best view of the square. The table is a circle and she still manages to be seated at the head of it, with her elbows spread regally across the armrests of her chair and her gloss gleaming in the sun. She doesn’t call them over when they come out onto the patio; she just lifts her chin and waits.

“Oh,” Eliot says. “She’s good.”

“Oh my god,” Q mutters behind him. “This is- beyond freaking stupid.”

Margo waits for them to set the table. Eliot has a whole strategy he’s cultivated; he keeps things orderly and aesthetically pleasing, but is deliberate about what he puts where. He sets the plate of cucumber sandwiches only within arm’s reach of the chair he’s mentally assigned to himself; he does the same with the gougères for the seat next to his, which he’s assigned to Quentin. Margo only gets easy access to the egg salad sandwiches, the flan, and the plain black tea. 

Quentin drops the entire carafe of margarita from too high up, so that it rattles and sloshes against the table, spilling a few unsightly yellow-green drops on the ivory tablecloth.

Margo stares at the stain, and then slowly lifts her face to him. When he stares back, stubborn, she unfolds a sweet, simpering smile and says, “Janet?”

Janet appears at the other end of the table. “Hi there!” she says. “How can I help?”

“How long did it take me to collect these two idiots,” Margo flicks her fingers out lazily at them, “and set up a decent forking shindig?”

“Thirteen minutes,” Janet reports, “thirty-three seconds, eight milliseconds, fifty-two—”

“Jesus, okay, we get it,” Margo says. “Save the robot shirt for the nerds, Janet.”

“Not a robot,” Janet says. “But okay.”

“Anyway.” Margo rises up from her seat, in one fluid motion. “You chorkleforks are welcome.” Quentin rolls his eyes, and she ignores him. “Enjoy yourselves. Or don’t, I don’t care. I’ve got better people to do.” She dips her chin just enough to give Eliot a mild glare over the tortoiseshell frames of her sunglasses. “So maybe hurry it the fork up, huh?”

She abandons her chair without pushing it back in. As she passes, she draws the tips of her nails across the back of Quentin’s shoulders. “Bye.”

Message heard, loud and clear. She is _very_ good.

Eliot plucks up a glass and circles around to the other side of the table, where he can reach the carafe of Tom Collins. “Sorry,” he says, when he catches Q staring at him. “Did you want? I can pour you a glass.”

“Are you serious right now?” Quentin says, so maybe not. “You’re just- going along with this?”

Eliot pours his own glass. “Why not? No reason to let it all go to waste.”

“It’s literally not possible to waste it,” Quentin says. “And even if it was, like, how is that our responsibility? She’s the one who dragged us all the way here, ordered all this stuff, and then left. She might think it’s a joke, but it’s not.”

So that’s— a lot. Eliot brings the carafe back up to his chest. “Okay,” he says carefully. “I think maybe I’ve missed a couple crucial elements here.”

“You haven’t,” Quentin snaps, so Eliot thinks he’s actually probably missed a _lot_ of crucial elements. Quentin drags one of the chairs out so that he can toss himself moodily into it. “I’m just starting to get sick of this—” He waves one hand at Margo’s vacated chair. “ —whatever this is. All her crap. It’s fine.”

Eliot leans over to pour him a glass of the Tom Collins anyway. “Don’t worry about her,” he says. “Let me handle it. That’s what all of this is about, right?”

Quentin stares at the glass as it fills. “No, I’m sorry,” he says, twisting his face away. “I’m being a jerk. It’s not Margo, it’s—” He sighs. “I still think you should be friends with her. Or that, like, you guys are already friends, basically, and just being super weird about it. So don’t- don’t screw that up for my sake, or anything.”

“We’re not,” Eliot answers mildly. “So I absolutely will, thank you.” Q glares at him, but there’s a ghost of a smile around the edges of it. “Let’s talk about something else, shall we?”

Quentin drags his glass closer to him. “Uh, yeah, okay,” he says. “That sounds great, actually.”

“Great,” Eliot says. He sits, kicking his feet up into one of the other empty chairs. “How’s thesis work going?”

Quentin drops his head down between his shoulders, palms splayed around his glass. “I changed my mind,” he says, muffled. “Can we go back to talking about Margo Hanson?”

“ _Now_ we can’t.” Eliot never gives up high ground once he has it. He picks at the cucumber sandwiches. “You lug all those books around with you everywhere.” Quentin shakes his head. “I’ve watched you read them.”

“Those aren’t for my thesis,” Quentin says. He takes a quick, impulsive gulp from his glass and then sets it back down, staring at it, fingers going tense at the base. “I haven’t— I mean, I’m still working, obviously, it’s just… I’m stuck. That’s all.”

“So they’re for fun?”

Quentin’s eyes dart guiltily away. “Um,” he says. “I mean, not exactly.”

And... at this point, Eliot knows what this is about, right? If he’s not- kidding himself. “Q,” he says, hopefully as gently as he means it. “If you actually want me to back off—”

“No,” Q says, quick but certain, gaze trained on the painted eggshell exterior of the café. “It’s not- it’s not you. I just, um. It’s kind of a lot.”

Which is probably the last out Eliot’s going to get on this. He could say something like, _“Well, we don’t need to get heavy at Margo Hanson’s punishment tea party,”_ and Q would relax, maybe even laugh, say, _“Yeah, god forbid I ruin the vibe of the meal she abandoned,”_ and then they’d eat their weight in little sandwiches and french pastries and it’d— be fine. Eliot wouldn’t have to think about this any more than he already has, could just sink right back down into the beautiful nothing he’s made for himself.

The only problem is, he— remembers. What it was like, doing all that for the first time, alone. And it’s getting harder and harder to find the space in his head where the nothing has room to swallow him up. 

He leans over to pluck his scone off its pretty pink plate. “Well, we’re here,” he tries. “Rubber ducky me to your heart’s content.”

Q’s mouth twists up, not entirely in a bad way. “Why do you have to— You’re making it sound weird.”

Eliot takes a bite. He gestures with the scone at the space between them. “And yet.”

It takes a bit, for Q to get there. He pulls one leg up into his chair so that he can hook one arm around his knee, tug it back against his chest. He fiddles with a plate of untouched eclairs, slowly rotating it in place on the table, focusing hard, like if he does this one thing perfectly it’ll make all the rest of it easier. 

“Uh, so,” he says eventually, without looking up, his voice too even. “Magic’s real.”

Yeah. 

The thing is, knowing it’s coming doesn’t make it less weird to hear somebody else say it, just- like that. Even when Eliot first knew it, like really _knew it,_ it was just— the feeling without words, sinking and visceral and certain. Even in the weeks and months and years after, of crawling through old web forums and illegal scans of banned books, it was never that plainly put, _“Magic is real.”_ It feels… he doesn’t know. Bad, but in a good way. Good, but in a bad way.

“I was talking to Janet,” Q explains. “A while ago, after we— you remember when we were talking about Atlantis?” His eyes dart up and then away again. “Nevermind. Uh, I don’t know why you would.”

“Oh, no,” Eliot says, “I definitely remember.” He busies himself refilling his glass when Q looks up at him again. “Not the parts _about_ Atlantis, but the rest of it, sure.” Q frowns, puzzled. Eliot smiles at him from behind the rim of his glass. “You leave your mouth open a lot when you’re excited.”

Q’s cheeks get a delightful flush going, so at least parts of this conversation can still be fun. “That’s not- even remotely my point.”

“I figured,” Eliot says. “Catch me up. What’s the deal with Atlantis?”

He can see Q chewing the inside of his cheek. “I mean, it’s not even anything specific,” he says. “I just couldn’t stop thinking about it, you know? My whole life, I’d thought it was just a story, I was _so_ sure it was just- myths and science fiction, so to find out—” He focuses on his hands, curled down in his lap. “Uh, I went back to my place the next morning, and I think I reread the same boring paragraph about the ideal self like, fifty times, at least. So I started asking Janet more questions. And it’s just—” He breathes in, shaky. “There’s so much, El. So much I didn’t— I had no idea.”

Eliot can relate. The only difference is he did it on the dark web on a library computer, under the one and only halfway-decent privacy spell he could ever get to work.

Half of his refill is already gone. He refills it again.

“I know it sounds… how it sounds,” Q is saying. “Crazy, or— stupid, or whatever. I mean, we’re freakin’—” He laughs, scrubbing at his eyes with one hand and flinging the other at the table. “Like, come on, right?”

“It doesn’t,” Eliot says. “Sound like any of those things.”

Quentin scoffs. “You don’t have to humor me.”

“I’m not.” 

And Quentin looks at him, obviously. He’s curious, obviously. He’s waiting for Eliot to follow up, because saying something like that implies follow-up, begs a question.

Eliot swallows, and looks at the sky.

“So, okay,” he says. “Magic’s real. What’s this got to do with your thesis?”

Quentin shrugs. “Nothing, I guess. It’s not like it’s relevant. I mean, I’m supposed to be writing about moralistic structures in fantasy and science fiction, how- how, like, the belief systems of authors influence the worlds they create. It’s not like I _knew_ when I picked the topic that there was this whole—” He stops, swallowing. It looks painful. 

“I mean,” he starts again, “look, just- just as an example. There’s all this research on the, like, origins of magic. Right? Where it comes from, how it works, how far back it can be traced in human societies, that sort of thing. I’m talking, a _lot_ of research. By all kinds of people, from all kinds of cultures. And the school of thought in, uh, I guess Western magical academia—” He laughs a little, and Eliot can hardly blame him. “— is pretty heavily based in this precise, scientific-method sort of approach? Like, it’s a lot of math. A lot of, uh, calculating angles and solving differentials and stuff. And I can’t stop thinking about how— like— Hang on.”

He’s twisting around in his seat, suddenly, craning his neck down at his feet, before he stops, dragging one hand back through his hair. “Shirt,” he says. “I left my bag at the house. There’s a thought experiment in one of the books Janet gave me that really gets at this.”

“That’s okay,” Eliot says. “I can’t read anyway.” Q looks up at him, bewildered and smiling. He’s cute. “Summarize it for me.”

“Well, I mean, I might butcher it, but,” but he’s sitting up to explain anyway, elbows on the table, “uh, the basic gist of it is… Like, there’s this huge focus on the science of magic, the procedure of it, right? But the most prevailing theory I could find about where magic actually _comes from_ is that on a, like, individual level, it _isn’t_ scientific. It’s not innate, or even really genetic, or whatever. It’s, um.” He stops. It’s only a moment, a handful of seconds at most, but that’s more than enough to be significant, when the baseline is him barely remembering to breathe. His forearms cross on the table, subdued. “It’s a response,” he finishes. “To— suffering, to pain. Of, um, all kinds.”

Right.

It’s— again, it’s not like this is something Eliot doesn’t already know. It is. He fucking knows. But having someone _say it,_ like that, like they understand it, too… It churns in his stomach, like either nausea or anticipation. He’s not sure which.

“Bummer,” Eliot hears himself say, like a fucking lunatic. “Sorry,” he says, to Q’s wide-eyed reaction. “That’s wasn’t— I hear what you’re saying, Q.”

But Q’s already laughing at him, tumbling back into his chair, thumbs against the corners of his eyes. “It’s fine,” he says. “You’re, uh, definitely not wrong. I don’t know if you’ve noticed this about me, but I’m kind of a professional mood killer.”

“Oh, no,” Eliot says, and Q is laughing _again,_ before he’s even done with his bit, “not the _mood_ we’d so carefully constructed.”

“Bummer,” Q says, muffled behind his hands.

“That’s cruel,” Eliot tells him. “Margo Hanson’s changed you. You’re a mean girl, Quentin Coldwater.”

“You know, the more I think about it, the more I feel like that analogy doesn’t really work? Like, it was definitely relevant when I said it, but it kinda falls apart after the first act.” 

“Mmhm,” Eliot says. “Unrelated, but has anyone ever told you that you think too much?”

Q’s smile peeks back out between his fingers. “Maybe once or twice.”

It’d be easy to kiss him, if Eliot wanted to. 

The angle might be weird for a second, and he would maybe have to brace his hand on Q’s empty armrest for stability, and Q would need to cooperate by lifting his chin just a bit— but they’re sitting close enough together that it’d be doable, if Eliot wanted to. 

He thinks Q would let him. He— knows that pretty confidently, actually. Q keeps Eliot’s stupid bottle cap in his pocket. He brings Eliot sweet breads in the morning, and stays with him into the afternoon, even when he doesn’t have to. He gets nervous and fidgety and turns a lovely, delicious shade of pink whenever Eliot dips just close enough, even still, even after they long-jumped the point of no return like it was nothing. He wants to go to the not-a-farmer’s-market, like what people from the city think a pair of idyllic rural gays look like.

No one would care. Q wouldn’t care; he wouldn’t even _think_ to care. He’d taste like citrus and juniper and sweet simple syrup, and he’d do that thing he does when alcohol or orgasms or whatever have finally wrung some sense of relaxation out of him— smile up into Eliot’s mouth like he’s solving a puzzle.

Jesus christ.

Eliot’s tipsy. Almost. That’s his excuse.

“Inasmuch as my opinion counts for anything,” he starts, and it isn’t- lost on him, the way Q sobers immediately, attentive, “I think you can probably write whatever you want. If that involves tweaking your premise a bit, or, you know, a lot… Well, why not, right? It isn’t as if you’re beholden to Columbia’s rubric now.”

“Yeah,” Q says. “I mean, thanks. It- It does count. Um, your opinion. It counts for a lot, actually, so— I appreciate it.” He draws his thumb around the rim of his glass. “I just... have to decide what I want, I guess. That’s what it comes down to.”

Eliot glances back at the square. Q was right; they’re definitely setting up for _something._ Eliot can see the colorful canvas roofs of a few booths that have already been set up, counters empty and unmanned. It seems to him against the spirit of being dead to put that much effort into anything resembling livelihood, but— whatever. Maybe he’s the only one that got the memo on how to do the afterlife right.

“In the meantime,” he says, “if you’re looking for the classic undergrad experience of falling behind on your work because the hot burnout you’re friends with invited you out…” He leans over to fill Q’s glass back to the top again, mostly for the flair of it. “I think I might be having a party tomorrow, on pain of metaphorical death.” 

Q watches him, with his tease of an almost-there smile. “Really,” he says, “you don’t wanna spend another three days arguing with yourself about the same two swatches of fabric?”

“Insolent Quentin wasn’t invited to this task force,” Eliot tells him, “Decisive Action Quentin was.” 

The smile flickers all the way on. “Yeah, you definitely never needed me for ‘decisive action.’”

He’s cute.

“Think of it this way,” Eliot says. “I get to keep you for one more night. We have some fun, wring you out. Get those imitation stress hormones out of your system.” He holds his glass out, a proffered cheers. “Then your thesis can have you back. Blank slate. Nothing but the possibility of eternity ahead of you. Et cetera.”

Q glances away, cheeks warm with color, like he’s exasperated and loving it. “Okay,” he says finally, and then he’s sitting up, scooping up his drink to knock it into Eliot’s with a cheerful, almost-too-melodic chorus of glass. “Yeah. Let’s do it.”

“Locked in,” Eliot says, “C’est parti,” and drinks.


End file.
